One Wish Outtakes
by K Nighthawk
Summary: A collection of One Wish one-shot side stories (part of the OW timeline) or outtakes (not part of the OW timeline, but with its characters), meant to add explanations that don't fit in with where the story is moving or add humor to a darkening story.
1. Side Story: Goshinboku

AN:  Yet another side story for One Wish, this one concerning Inu-Yasha.  I thought it made a good story, but the whole thing doesn't fit into what I'm doing with One Wish.  So hopefully this clears up all the mystery surrounding why Inu-Yasha is four hundred years younger than he should be.

Disclaimer: I'd like to think of it as borrowing Inu-Yasha with no intention of returning him.

**Goshinboku**

-- Sengoku Jidai --

Shouting villagers ran after a figure dressed all in red, leaping from rooftop to rooftop.

"It's Inu-Yasha!"

"He's got the jewel!"

"Someone find the priestess!"

A young woman, dressed in traditional miko's garb walked slowly through the forest the figure in red raced towards.  Her steps were carefully measured, and she clung to her bow as if it were the only thing keeping her alive.  Blood dripped down the back of her gi, staining the ground she walked upon.

The figure in red leapt from the rooftop to a branch of a nearby tree and raced into the woods, silver hair flying in the wind.  In one clawed hand, he held a beaded necklace with a large pink jewel attached to it.

The woman spotted the fleeing demon at the same time he saw her.

"Why did you betray me, Inu-Yasha?"  She asked, raising her bow to take aim.

"Kikyo?"  His look of surprise and confusion disappeared into a grimace of pain as a glowing pink arrow shot through his shoulder, pulling him back to the tree he had just leapt out of.  He slumped unconscious against the tree, arrow pinning him to it.  The necklace fell out of his limp hand to sparkle innocently at the base of the tree.

The woman fell to the ground, the pain from the fresh, jagged claw marks on her back too much for her.  The villagers raced up, a small girl with a bandage covering one eye leading them.

"Oneesama!" She cried, kneeling beside the fallen priestess.

"Kaede-chan," the woman whispered painfully, reaching a hand up to touch the girl's tear-stained cheek.  "Burn the jewel with my body.  This must not happen again."  Her eyes went blank and her hand fell to the forest floor.

"Oneesama!" The girl cried, shaking the woman.  Strong hands pulled her away from the dead body.  She wept in her captor's arms, wishing for her sister back.

A villager picked up the fallen necklace.  "What do we do with the jewel?"

The girl eyed it, remembering how it was said to grant one wish.  Surely it could bring her oneesama back.

But oneesama had died to keep others from using it.  Wishing oneesama back with it was wrong.  And she had said to burn it with her body.  Decision made, she spoke.

"We will follow oneesama's last wish.  Burn it with her body."  And she fled back to the village, weeping.

---

A tall man dressed in white stood before the base of the ancient tree, looking up at the pinned boy.

"You always were a fool, little brother," he said, knowing the boy couldn't hear him.

-- December 1887, Tokyo, Japan --

A man stood with his wife and three small children, looking at the steep hill with distaste.  The children were two boys, looking to be ten and five, and the youngest was a cute girl of four.

"We will have to replace the steps.  The wooden ones are all gone.  Rocks will work better," he said to woman.

"Do we have to live here?" The older boy whined.  "I want to go back to our old house.  It didn't have all these stairs."

"This shrine belonged to your great-uncle, Akira-chan.  When he died, he left it to us, and we shall do as your honored ancestor requested and live here.  You will like it, you'll see."

The younger two children raced up the staircase, intent on seeing their new home.  The eldest followed grudgingly behind his parents.

"Look touchan, sleepy man!" The younger boy called out.

"Yeah, sleepy man!" The girl repeated.

The adults walked over to where the two children stood, pointing up to a part of the large tree where a jagged yellow scar was.

"Haku-chan, Rei-chan, you have a vivid imagination," the woman said, seeing nothing there.

Akira thought he saw a flash of red as he stared at the scar, but it disappeared, leaving him thinking nothing had been there.

"He's really there, kaachan!  He's got silver hair, and furry ears on the top of his head, and red clothes, and there's an arrow sticking out of him!"  Haku argued, upset his mother didn't believe him.

"Sleepy man!" The girl said again.

"Stop lying to your mother," the man said.  "We need to go look at the house and see what needs to be fixed up.  You three find something to amuse yourself and stay out of kaasan's and mine way, okay?"

"Hai, tousan," the three said dully.

"Akira-chan, make sure your brother and sister don't hurt themselves."

"Hai, tousan."

Akira glanced around the yard, bored.  The younger two ran to stand at the base of the ancient tree, pointing up to nothing he could see and daring the other to pet them.

He walked over to where the two stood and looked up.  Again, that odd flash of red where the yellow scar was in the tree's trunk.  It lasted longer this time, and there was silver as well.

"What are you talking about?" He asked.

Rei pointed up to the scar, her aim a bit off.  She was pointing at where he had seen the silver.  "Furry inu ears!"

"I want to pet them!"  Haku added.  "Can I climb up and pet them?"

"Me too!  Me too!"

Akira sighed.  "Keep them out of trouble, he says.  As if it's even possible.  They look for it," he muttered.  "How would you get up the tree?"

Rei and Haku exchanged incomprehensible babble.  Sometimes he wished he were young enough to remember their baby language, but not very often.  Kaasan always patted them on the head and called them cute when they did that.

"You boost us!" Haku said excitedly.  "You're a big kid, and we're little.  Easy!"

"Boost, boost!"  Rei said, clapping her hands.

At least some people thought he was a big kid.  He looked over at the house their parents had disappeared into.  He could hear his mother complaining about dust in rooms jiisan hadn't kept clean.  Akira knew he wouldn't clean a room if nobody planned on living in it, so what was her problem?  But his father seemed to be tied up in calming her, so they wouldn't be out to check on them any time soon.

"Sure, Haku-chan.  Let me boost you first so you can help Rei-chan up."

After a few false starts, Akira managed to snag the lowest branch, and Haku climbed over him onto the branch.  Akira refrained from yelling at him not to step on his head again.  He shoved dark bangs out of his blue-gray eyes from where they had moved during Haku's scramble up into the tree.

"Your turn, Rei-chan," he said, still pulling the branch down.  Rei looked fearfully up at the tall tree, then back at her brothers.

"Chicken!"  Haku called down to her.  "Rei's a chicken, can't climb a dumb old tree!"

Akira rolled his eyes as Rei's chocolate brown eyes flashed angrily and she quickly climbed up into the tree to bop Haku on the head.

"Not chicken!  Not chicken!  Just seeing how far it is to fall."

Akira nimbly climbed onto a higher branch than the one his younger siblings were currently quarreling on.  He still couldn't see their so-called 'sleepy man.'  But both had gone too far for this to be one of their usual stories.

"So where's this sleepy man?" He asked, getting their attention.

"Dog ears!" Rei said, quickly scampering further up into the tree, Haku not far behind her.

"Bakas."  He had monkeys for siblings.

He climbed up to where they sat on a strange thick vine that twisted around much of the tree's trunk.  The odd yellow scar was in front of them, and both children were daring each other to touch 'him' and see if 'he' was really asleep.

Akira stared at the scar, wondering what the little ones could see that he couldn't.  The flash was clearer this time, red clothing.  But it disappeared again.

Haku seemed to have won the argument with 'girls are such babies,' and Rei inched closer to the scar.  Akira watched as her hand closed on something that was not there and tugged.  Make-believe had never been so weird.  She jerked her hand back.

Haku giggled.  "Sleepy man didn't move!  Maybe he's dead."

Akira climbed up to sit on another branch and reached his hand out to touch the scar.

Rei yelped.

"Niichan stuck his hand through sleepy man's chest!"  Haku said.  He traced his hand along Akira's arm, but stopped at something Akira hadn't around his elbow.  Haku quickly pulled his hand away.

Akira pulled his hand away from the scar and practically fell out of the tree as a man appeared right where his hand had been, an arrow through his left shoulder.  He wore a red haori and hakama.  Akira understood those were the red flashes he had seen.  The man had long silver hair and furry white dog ears.  Those were obviously what the babies were fussing over.

"Wow," he said dumbly.  "You two babies weren't lying.  There really is someone here."

Haku stuck his tongue out at his brother.  "We're not babies.  We see sleepy man before you."

"If you two keep making so much noise, maybe you'll wake him up," Akira said.  "He's got funny hair and ears.  I think he's a demon."

"Demons die out long ago!" Haku argued.

"They could have been put on trees like him," Akira pointed to the still sleeping man.  "I didn't see him until I touched the funny mark on the tree.  And who would believe babies when they say there's a man sleeping in the tree?"

It might have made sense to an adult, but to six-year-old Haku, it was just grown-up babble.  "Not demon!  Demons all dead!"

"What if he wakes up and he is demon?  Will he eat us?"  Rei asked, brown eyes wide with fear.

"Iie, Rei-chan.  He's stuck to the tree," Akira reassured her.

"Would the three of you just shut the hell up already?" The man suddenly yelled.  All three children screamed, losing their balance and sliding to lower branches.

"And stop screaming!  It hurts my ears.  Fucking kids, can't even fucking- holy shit!  Where's that damned priestess?"

"Is sleepy man babbling to himself?" Rei asked, still holding tightly onto the branch she had managed to grab before she fell to the ground.  Akira reached over and helped her back up.

"He's got a dirty mouth.  Kaasan won't like him," Akira said.

"Oi, kids, can one of you pull this arrow out?  I promise to kill you quickly."

"Kaasan really won't like him."

"I don't want to die.  Maybe let sleepy man stay there?" Haku said from the branch beside Rei.

The man growled.  "Go get Kikyo, you stupid ningen pups."

"Who's Kik-o?" Haku asked bravely.  "We not know her."

"Sleepy man maybe remember dead lady?"  Rei offered.

"Quit fucking calling me sleepy man!  My name's Inu-Yasha, you morons!"  He yelled at them.  "And do something helpful, like pull this arrow out.  It fucking hurts like hell!"

"Inu. Yasha?  Girl dog demon?" Haku said hesitantly.

"He no look like girl," Rei pointed out.

Akira thought it was pretty funny.  "Maybe he looked like a girl when he was born and they didn't change the mistake."

The man was beyond pissed.  "Get me the fuck down from here!"

"Down is good," Rei agreed.  She climbed down the tree away from the angry dog demon.

Akira and Haku followed after her.

"Oi, don't leave me up here!" Inu-Yasha yelled.  All three ran back to the house, away from the screaming demon.  "I'm going to fucking kill you!"

---

Their parents still didn't hear him yelling.  Rei said it was magic and, baby though Rei was, Akira was inclined to believe her.  How else would the man still be alive with an arrow in him?  He wasn't even bleeding.  And he was a demon.  If there were demons, why not magic?

It kept the kids up at night, the yelling for someone to let him down.  But they all remembered the promise of being killed quickly if they did, so they kept well away from the tree.

Which was why all three were startled when another silver-haired man showed up while tousan was at work and kaasan was in the bath.

"Children," he said coolly as he looked down at the three muddy figures playing near the well.  "I should have expected innocents to be the one to wake the baka.  I could hear him yelling all the way back to my lands."

All three stared up at him, silent.  He looked a lot like the man still yelling about stupid kids and fucking priestesses.

"This Sesshoumaru believes your parents cannot hear him," the man said to them.

All three nodded mutely.  If their parents could hear the foul language the demon was using, they would have shut him up days ago.

"Interesting that you can.  Perhaps because of the age," he mused.  "Or else the blood is not so thin as I had first assumed."

"Are you here to take grumpy man away?" Rei asked quietly.  All three had come to a silent understanding that the cool man looking down at them was much scarier than the angry man still stuck to their tree.

"Unfortunately, only someone with holy powers can remove the arrow keeping him there."  The man didn't look too upset about that.  Akira thought he didn't like the angry demon anymore than they did.

"How come tousan and kaasan can't see him?" Akira asked.

"A spell was placed on him to keep ningens from seeing him.  The priestess did not want him to be rescued."  The tall man didn't explain why the children could see him.

"Are you youkai too?"

"Hai.  And Inu-Yasha is only half demon.  Do not call him youkai."

"Sesshoumaru, you bastard, come out where I can see you!  I know you're there, I can smell you!"

The three children watched as the tall man walked over to the Goshinboku to look up at the pinned hanyou.

"Four hundred and fifty-six years, little brother.  That is how long you have slept on this tree."

"Quit fucking lying, Sesshoumaru."

"Look around you, little brother.  Do you think ningens would advance so much in a single decade?  You're more of a fool than I thought."

The children inched closer to the two.  The tall man had called Inu-Yasha little brother.  Maybe he could explain why there was a demon pinned to their tree?

Inu-Yasha started cursing.  All three children covered their ears, not wanting to hear more.  Sesshoumaru waited impassively for the string of curses to stop.

"The miko died minutes after binding you, little brother.  I'm surprised you managed to land a hit."

"Ka?"

"The wounds on her back smelled of you.  I thought you had picked up a weak emotional human attachment to the woman, but it seems this was not the case."

"I didn't touch her!  She was wounded?"  Inu-Yasha sounded puzzled.

Akira was beginning to understand what had happened.  Inu-Yasha had attacked some priestess, and before she died, she shot him into a tree.

"Magic," he told Rei.  "You were right.  Demons and magic.  What else is there?"

Sesshoumaru grew impatient with Inu-Yasha's mutterings about smells and blood.  The children giggled as a well-placed rock knocked the hanyou unconscious.  "Children."  All three looked up at him.  "How did he awaken?"

All three exchanged glances.  Rei and Haku's eyes voted Akira to be their spokesperson.  He shrugged.  "Dunno.  I couldn't see him at first, but the babies made me help them climb the tree.  Rei pulled on nothing I could see," Akira paused and waited for Rei's usual comment.

"Koinu!  Doggy ears!  Kawaii!"

"And I touched the scar on the tree trunk."  He was stopped this time by Sesshoumaru.

"What scar?"

"You can't see it now, but it's where the arrow is in the tree."

"Niichan put his hand through Inu-Yasha's chest!" Haku added helpfully.

"Like sleepy man was ghost!  Or else Kira-niichan is ghost," Rei said, pinching Akira to make sure he was still corporeal.

"Itai!"

"And what happened then?"

"We argued over whether or not he was a demon.  And then he yelled at us to shut up.  And hasn't stopped yelling since."

"Dirty mouth," Rei said.

Sesshoumaru was silent.

"Maybe Kira-niichan has magic and woke up dog man like Sleeping Beauty?" Rei suggested.

"Ick, I don't want to kiss him!"  Akira said, making a face.

"Boy," Sesshoumaru said.  Akira and Haku looked up expectantly.  "How did you come to see Inu-Yasha if you could not at first?"

Haku looked relieved he wasn't the one being questioned.  "I saw him after I touched the scar on the tree."

Inu-Yasha finally woke up.  "Who the fuck threw something at me?" He yelled.

The children giggled, while Sesshoumaru looked as impassive as always.

"Do you want down, little brother?"

"Fuck yes!"

"You realize you will owe a debt to the one who releases you," Sesshoumaru warned.

"Like hell I will.  I'll just kill them and then there's no-"

"I'm not helping," Akira said.  "He keeps talking about killing us.  He's not nice, and he says bad things, and he deserves to stay up there forever!"

"Listen, you little fuck, I've spent the past two weeks stuck to this fucking tree _awake_, not even counting the supposed _centuries_ I've fucking been here unconscious, and I'm not spending anymore time-"

"I suggest you listen to the boy, Inu-Yasha, unless you truly do not have any honor."

"Fuck honor, Sesshoumaru!  I'm not about to owe my life to some stupid kids."

All three children ran away, not wanting to hear any more threats.

"Then you will be up there until you starve to death, little brother."  Sesshoumaru left the shrine.

"Get back here you bastard!"

In the bathhouse, the children's mother could be heard scolding the three for getting so dirty.

---

Akira sat at the base of the tree, looking up at the silent hanyou.  How long would they be stuck with him?  It had been months since the older dog demon had come and told them that it was one of them who had to pull the arrow out to release the hanyou.  Other demons had come by to laugh at the hanyou's expense, making it even more impossible to sleep.  How many curses could one person know?

"What the hell do you want?"

"How long do you plan on threatening to kill us?"

"I'm not going to stop.  Ningens are useless, and their runts even more so.  Who's going to miss a couple?"

"You're part human too, you know.  Sesshoumaru said so."

"Yeah, well, I was on the way to fixing that when I ended up here."

He wasn't as intimidating when he wasn't yelling, Akira noted.

"Why do you want to kill us after we release you?"

"I owe my life to no one.  I refuse to have debts."

Akira thought for a while.  It really wasn't fair to let the man stay up there forever, but he had to have some way to keep Rei and Haku safe.

Something hit him.  "Hey, inu.  How old is your brother if he was alive before you got sealed to the Goshinboku?"

"What kind of stupid question is that?"

"A good one!"

"Feh.  He's six hundred or so.  Youkai don't play close attention to time."

"So if he's a full demon and looks young at six centuries of life, how old would you be before you died?"

"It's not like hanyous are common, kid.  None have ever died of old age."

Akira thought the trapped hanyou sounded sad.  It made him seem more human to Akira.

"Well then why don't we make a deal?  That way you won't have a debt, you'll have a promise to keep."

Promises were much better than debts, Akira thought.

"What's that?"

"You look out for my family either until the bloodline dies out or you die, and I'll release you from the tree."

"That could take centuries!"

"Would you rather wait until someone decides to cut the tree down?  It's a holy tree on a Shinto shrine, that could take even longer."

"I'm not going to baby-sit a ningen family for a fucking millennium.  I've got other things to do with my time."

"Not right now, you don't," Akira pointed out.

"Not forever," Inu-Yasha repeated.

Akira frowned.  Maybe that was a bit long.  "How long did your brother-"

"Half-brother," Inu-Yasha corrected.

"Half-brother say you had been bound to the Goshinboku?" Akira finished.

"Four hundred something years."

"Then why not watch over the family for that long?"

Inu-Yasha was silent for a while.  Akira thought it was a good trade-off.  Sleep four hundred years, repay the one who rescued you by watching his family for four hundred years, and then go on your own way.

"You don't have to tell me now," Akira said, getting up from where he had been sitting.  "It's not like you're going anywhere."  He grinned.

Inu-Yasha chuckled softly.  "You know, kid, you're not too bad."

"You're not to bad yourself, Inu-Yasha."  Once he stopped cussing and threatening to kill people, anyway.

"I'll think about it."

---

Perhaps his brother wasn't as stubborn as he had assumed him to be.  It had only been six months, and already he had lost the hate that kept the ningen children from coming near him.  The smaller two were still afraid of him, but the eldest seemed to have a good head on his shoulders.

Perhaps it was memories of Inu-Yasha when he was very young, but Sesshoumaru couldn't find it in himself to hate ningen spawn as much as he hated the adults of the species.

He watched from the roof of the house as the eldest ningen boy climbed up to where Inu-Yasha was.  The hanyou nagged the small child for being so slow and clumsy, but the boy looked to be pretty good for a ningen.

The boy hesitantly placed his hand around the arrow and tugged.  As Sesshoumaru had expected, blue light of ningen magic swirled around the two, and the arrow disappeared from the boy's hand and Inu-Yasha's shoulder.  Both went falling to the ground.  Inu-Yasha grabbed the boy and landed gracefully on his feet.

"Whoa," the boy said as Inu-Yasha set him down.  "That's a really long way to fall."

"Feh, you were fine with me around."

"I kept my part of the bargain, Inu-Yasha, now you keep yours," the boy said in a warning tone.

"Sure, kid.  Just don't plan on me moving in.  I've got a whole new world to get used to."

Not to mention he still had something of their father's that Sesshoumaru would have to tell him about if he planned on taking his promise of protection seriously.

The boy watched as Inu-Yasha waved to the two small dark-haired children peeking over the well at them, bidding them farewell, and ran over to the shrine's steps down.  He paused and turned around to look over at the boy.

"Hey, kid, I never did catch your name."

The boy grinned, his gray-blue eyes lighting up.  "It's Akira.  Meirin Akira."


	2. Outtake: On Youkai and Guns

AN: These take no specific place in the _One Wish_ timeline, but I had some spare time on my hands and had hit another snag on the latest chapter (nothing major, just deciding what information to share and what to hold back for the next chapter), and decided to take a break by writing a couple of shorts. And if anyone has any other questions about the _One Wish_ characters' pasts, just put in a request and I'll see if I can't make a story for it.

Summary: Is anyone wondering why, no matter who it is doing the fighting, nobody resorts to firearms? Our favorite inu youkai clears it up for us.

Disclaimer: Sesshoumaru courtesy of Rumiko Takahashi.

On Youkai and Guns 

The idiot was pointing a gun into his chest. Had he been shorter, or the idiot taller, it likely would have been his face. Not that it would matter. Bullets were much too small to be anything but a minor irritation, especially to one such as he. And had the gun not actually been pressed into his chest, the flight path of a bullet was tediously easy to read and thus avoid.

"Wipe that smirk off your face, jackass. You completely ruined me! And you're going to pay for that!"

Humans were such emotional creatures. That would be the main difference between their two species. They made decisions based off what they inappropriately called their 'heart,' while he made his solely upon rational, logical thought.

He was content to stare down at the irate man, scorn obvious is his hard gold eyes.

The other seemed unhappy about this. He emptied the contents of his gun into the silver-haired youkai.

He repressed a sigh. This had happened twice this week alone. And he was no longer feeling merciful. One hand grabbed the gun; the other grabbed the man by the neck and lifted him two feet off the ground.

"You are an annoyance," he told the wide-eyed man in a deceptively calm voice. His tightened his grip around the gun. Opening his hands, the ruined pieces of the small firearm dropped uselessly to the ground. "This Sesshoumaru does not like to be annoyed."

Blood dripped from the six bullet holes in Sesshoumaru's chest, but nothing about him suggested he even felt the injuries.

The man was reduced to babbling incoherently as his stare wavered between what used to be his gun and the harsh, unrelenting gaze of the tall youkai. Sesshoumaru's glare hardened even further.

As the youkai continued to hold the quivering human up by his throat, there was a soft tinkle of metal on asphalt as six spent bullets were expelled from the wounds they had inflicted.

He considered telling the human it was useless to shoot him, but it was fairly obvious by now and it was not in his nature to point out the obvious, even for idiots.

"You will not live to regret your actions," he told the man, his hand taking on a green acidic sheen, and crunching loudly through the bones of his neck.

He opened his hand and let the body drop to the ground.

The trickle of blood from his chest had completely stopped.


	3. Outtake: Only Drunks and Children

AN: It began with the idea of Chame telling Kagome what happened the first time she and Mischa went drinking. And it sort of expanded from there. Completely pointless fun with alcohol and shapeshifters.

Disclaimer: Kagome, Souta, Inu-Yasha courtesy of Rumiko Takahashi. Matsuro, Chame, and Mischa products of a deranged mind and not for sale. (Though borrowing with permission is allowed.)

Only Drunks and Children 

Chame had dragged her into a bar. It was an interesting bar; overpopulated by women who all seemed to ignore the few men who were there, intent on dancing with each other on the dance floor and not picking up dates for their next one-night stand.

Chame was pretty good at shapeshifting. The young kitsune had changed from her usual human child form to that of a blue-haired woman with the curves of Marilyn Monroe, dressed in black leather hiphuggers and a silver, probably spandex, midriff shirt. Kagome thought it was a bit tactless of the shapeshifter to take a beautiful form, show it off to full advantage, and all the while laugh her ass off at everybody who tried to pick her up. Though a meaner side of her said it was pretty damn funny, and if she was as drunk as the currently blue-haired girl, she'd be laughing at them too.

The kitsune was currently in a drinking game with another woman at the counter. Though it seemed to have ended, the other woman passing out as Chame continued to giggle inanely.

Chame always giggled inanely, so she wasn't sure if the kitsune actually was drunk. She certainly smelled it, and had certainly imbibed enough to be drunk, but youkai physiology was different than humans.

"Did I tell you 'bout th' firs' time I did this?" The blue-haired woman asked, voice sounding as if she was drunk, but more coherent than she had thought the girl would be. "Me 'n Kage got in trouble, and the miko-sama said that if one of us confessed to doin' it, the other'd get off scot-free. But if neither 'f us 'fessed up, we'd both get beat."

The girl raised her glass at the bartender, silently asking for a refill. It was probably something a lot harder than the can of beer she was currently sipping on. She'd be surprised if she finished it, truth be told.

"Anyways," the girl drawled out, continuing her story. "I waited 'til her human day. Course, she didn' know I knew, so she couldn' tell me no. And then I pounced!" And she proceeded to do so on the bartender, who was ignoring her request. Firmly latching both hands onto one arm, fixing brilliant pale eyes on the startled man, she ordered, "You, more sake, now!"

He tried detaching the blue-haired woman. "Lady, you've had plenty."

"I c'n still see straight. Def'nly haven' had enough," the blue-haired woman said, hand tightening.

"Fine, I'll see what I can do." She let go and he quickly moved to the other side of the long counter. Both girls giggled.

"And I made a bet wi' her. Whoe'er passed out firs' had to 'fess up to Ginta's new haircut." The kitsune snickered, then hiccupped. "Act'lly, she couldn' refuse, since she still was refusing to talk. 'N I'd already gotten her fixed enough t' hav' some sense 'f pride," the kitsune said, keeping her pale glare on the bartender- one more sign that she was not as drunk as she appeared.

Though her father had been very good at glaring when drunk. She shook her head, burying the memories Chame innocently brought up.

"So what exactly was the bet?" She prodded.

"T' see who could out drink th' other, o'course," Chame said, head lolling to the side for her to look lazily over at the dark-haired woman. "Was the funniest thing ever."

She paused in her story to accept her drink from the slightly wary bartender and to glare off another taker for her drinking game. "G'way. 'M busy."

Kagome was beginning to get a little suspicious of the bar, but was too interested in Chame's drunken and decidedly jumbled story to dwell on it long.

"Where was I?" The kitsune asked, turning her attention back to Kagome.

"Getting drunk."

"Oh, righ'." The kitsune downed the glass and motioned for another refill. The bartender gave up on convincing her to cut back on the alcohol, and refilled her glass. Kagome's was still more than half full. "So I conjure up a couple of jugs of sake. Kage's pullin' her usual big-eyed stare, an' complee'ly unhelpful f'r the conjurin'," the kitsune whined, forgetting that a young human child- especially one who was usually hanyou- would know nothing of using magic.

Kagome tsk'ed at Mischa's lack of thoughtfulness in the quest to get smashed, and raised her beer to her lips to hide the grin that was spreading across her face.

Chame either didn't catch on to Kagome's humor or else misinterpreted it. She leaned forward to whisper confidentially- quite loud enough for everybody to hear, "And y'know wha? She's a damn talkative drunk."

Kagome joined Chame in giggling over the idea of a chibi-Mischa babbling away over anything and everything.

"I think," the kitsune continued on in her half-drunken state, "she _wants_ to talk, but there's a real psycho- um, physicianal- um…" the kitsune paused to try and remember the word.

"Physical?"

"I don' think so. That one where it's real pain, not ghost pain," the blue-haired woman said, waving one hand off-handedly. "Anyways, a _real_ problem for her and she can' do it. Talk, I mean. But drunks, they don' feel pain, not like sober pleeple do. So issokay fo' her to talk as much as she wants when drunk. 'Cause she don' feel t' pain."

Kagome thought there were a couple problems with Chame's story, but decided drunks should be humored. "And the point of your story is?"

"Um… getting' drunk is fun? No, wait, tha's th' othe' one. Oh, yeah, the moral of the story is, if you wanna get a half-demon drunk, y'gotta wait 'til their human day. 'Cause then they can' smell th' stuff an' their demon blood won' cleanse it the moment it hits their system." Each word came slower and slower, until with the last word, the blue-haired girl slumped forward, forehead hitting the counter with a thunk barely audible over the music.

"Chame-chan, this isn't the best place to fall asleep," Kagome informed the blue-haired woman.

The bartender quickly reappeared. "Thought that stuff would never work," he said. "Damn kit's got the constitution of a charging rhinoceros."

"Eh?" Kagome said, peering fuzzily at the man.

He leaned forward so that their faces were almost touching, keeping his voice low, "If you want to pick up men, it's best not to go to a gay bar."

The alcohol had left her pleasantly buzzed, but it was also seriously slowing down her ability to think. "Gay bar?" She looked back the swarm of people on the dance floor. Come to think of it, most of the couples were same-sex. "Huh. Guess Chame got lost finding the right bar. Uh… do I know you?" she asked the bartender.

"Really, Kagome-sama, I'm hurt that you have so quickly forgotten our short, but altogether glorious, days together."

"Oi, red, what did you put in her sake?" a woman asked, poking at the sleeping blue-haired girl.

Kagome was too busy trying to remember previous boyfriends to pay close attention to the speaker.

"Ah, hanyou, right on time. Actually, it was 100-proof whiskey, and she's been drinking it all night long. Though that last refill was just sleeping powder."

The woman lifted Chame's head off the counter, then released it, and it hit the counter with another thunk.

Deciding that the bartender was definitely none of her few exes, Kagome greeted the woman. "Hey, Mischa," she said. "Funny, we were just talking about you."

The bartender's eyes twinkled as Mischa drawled out, "How fascinating." She leaned over, wrapped one of Chame's arms around her shoulder, then her own about the unconscious girl's waist, and dragged her up out of the barstool.

"You aren't getting out of here that easily, you realize," the bartender said.

"Mat-kun?"

"She's drunk, isn't she?" Mischa asked accusingly.

"Well, the guy I'm impersonating would be hard at work trying to slip Rohypnol into her drink, since he's an idiotic straight guy who thinks-"

"That's enough information, red."

"So while I'm not going so far as to actually drug her, I can't be seen giving her the hard lemonade she ordered. Because he definitely wouldn't, and he's a good enough people-reader to know she can't tell vodka from champagne."

"Are you taking me home too?" Kagome asked, rising unsteadily to her feet. "Because he says it's a gay bar, and I really don't think about girls that way-"

"More's the pity," he mourned.

"-And since Chame-chan's asleep, I don't want to stay here."

"Can you wait for me to get her out to the car, Kags? This is a bit awkward," the dark-haired woman said.

"Her suggestion is going to wear off soon," Matsuro warned, and Mischa nodded and faked a drunken stagger towards the exit, should the weakening suggestion Chame had up fail before they left.

"What's going on?"

"Chame was just doing as is her kitsune nature and trying to get you into trouble. I just like coming to watch the show," he said, motioning towards the dance floor. "You'll find I'm very open-minded."

Kagome giggled, not entirely sure at what.

"You probably shouldn't let people drag you to bars, Kagome-sama. They're not as much fun as you think they are."

She noticed her can was empty. That wasn't right. "Can I have more?"

"Depends on what you're offering in return," he said.

"Chame pulled me out the door before I could grab my purse," she said.

"How'd you plan on paying?"

"Chame stole Mischa's wallet," she said with a snicker. She thought that over. "So _that's_ why Mischa's here! To get her wallet back."

Matsuro chuckled. "Kagome-sama, you are beyond drunk."

"So, can I have more?"

"Your cousin would kill me." He paused. "What do you want?"

"Yatta!" Kagome said, giving him an awkward hug over the counter. "Rum. It's warm. No ice."

"Kagome-sama, gay bar, remember? You're supposed to hug the women here, not the guy serving you drinks," he said, opening a new bottle to pour into a short glass.

"Okay," she said, starting to stand, before sinking back onto the barstool. "Maybe after I find my feet."

"They're usually on the end of your legs," he said helpfully, noting a new customer approaching.

"Scotch on rocks," the woman said, sitting down next to the girl looking for the ends of her legs. "I haven't seen you here before."

Kagome looked up from her feet and grinned, "I've never been here before. Chame-chan brought me and Mischa's wallet, but Mischa wants it back, so she took Chame away."

"So you're here by yourself?"

"Yeah," Kagome said. "They left me." She took a sip of her rum.

Matsuro returned with a short glass filled with a dark amber liquid, ice cubes clinking. "Your drink, miss. Kagome-san, you really shouldn't be drinking anymore. You're going to end up going home with someone here, and I'm going to be very upset if it isn't me."

Kagome put the glass down. "Sorry, Mat-kun."

"Why would you want to go home with him? You can do much better," the woman asked.

"I doubt that," he said, taking the drink away from Kagome.

"Mat-kuuun, get your own, that's mine!"

"I thought you weren't having any more."

"Yeah, but," the girl stopped.

"Yes?"

"It's still my drink!"

"You can have mine," the woman said, pushing the girl her glass.

"I can? Thank you!" Kagome hugged the girl. "I like you," she said pulling away.

"Really? Not going to go home with your Mat-kun then?" the woman asked, inching closer the younger woman.

"Of course I'm not," Kagome said. "He's going to be here all night, and Mischa and me have work tomorrow."

"Ah," the woman said, losing some interest at the repetition of the name. "So who's Mischa?"

"Mischa's… ne, Mat-kun, who is Mischa, again?" Kagome asked, blinking fuzzily at the amused bartender.

He said with a completely straight face, "Your roommate."

"Right," Kagome said with a firm nod. "My roommate," she told the woman. "We sleep together."

Matsuro had a sudden coughing fit.

"Taken then? You have fun waiting for your… roommate," the woman said, returning to the dance floor- still without a drink.

"You sleep together?" Matsuro asked, wheezing for breath. "Kagome-sama, you are the most naïve human I have ever come across. Sleep together, she says."

"Isn't that what it's called?" Kagome asked, already working on emptying the glass of Scotch.

"Quite right," a low voice said, arms circling around Kagome's waist as someone set her chin on the girl's shoulder. "Oi, red, put it on my bill."

Matsuro was speechless. He knew his mind was permanently in the gutter, but this took the cake. Youkai had no qualms about gender or whether their bed partner was family, but the miko was something else entirely.

"Can we go now?" Kagome asked, slipping from Mischa's grasp to again battle vertigo, only to collapse onto her cousin. "I'm sleepy," she mumbled into Mischa's sweater.

"Hanyou," Matsuro started.

She looked over at the shapeshifted kitsune, her usual poker face in place, with the exception of a barely evident look of malicious amusement in her eyes.

"We'll talk later."

She gave him a flat look that said that talk would happen right after the snowball became flame-retardant.

"Shin, you're going to have to at least try to stand," Mischa told the human mumbling incoherently.

"M'kay."

Matsuro returned to bartending, keeping one eye on the departing couple.

Something was off.

**-----**

Kagome was throwing up in the bathroom. He had already learned his lesson about heavy drinking, but obviously his older sister hadn't until now.

Souta wasn't sure where Inu-Yasha was. Probably the roof. The inu hanyou seemed to like it there.

Nor did he know where the dark-haired shapeshifter was. The last time he had seen the young kitsune, she had a very youkai grin on her face- all pointy teeth and completely malicious.

Mischa was on the window seat, face buried in the business pages the day's newspaper.

And Matsuro was watching Mischa the way his teacher did when he thought no one was listening to his lecture. And the last time that had happened, half of the class had ended up in detention for blowing up the science lab. Which was because the handout had the wrong amount of sulfur to add, and no one had paid attention to his correction. Souta _knew_ the teacher had made that typo on purpose.

"So did you have fun last night?" the redhead asked the wolf-girl.

The newspaper lowered a few inches for the woman to give Matsuro a 'what the hell are you talking about?' look, then came back up.

Souta was a bit amused as the kitsune's face went from blank confusion, to realization, and then to a pissed off look that promised beheading.

"Shin," the redhead whispered, then shouted, "Chame!"

Snickering could be heard coming from underneath the sofa.

Souta decided not ask.

**Vocabulary:**

-Chan- Honorific used to show endearment

Chibi- Small

Hanyou- Half demon

Inu- Dog

Kage- Shadow, Chame's nickname for Mischa

Kitsune- Fox demon, master of illusion and changing their shape

Miko- Priestess

Ne- Hey or right, depending on context

Rohypnol- One of the three main date-rape drugs

-Sama- Honorific meant to show great respect

Shin- Heart, Chame's nickname for Kagome

Youkai- Demon


	4. Side Story: Death Rides the Railways

AN: The outtakes section is for character history, I suppose. Flavor stuff mostly unnecessary to _One Wish'_s plot, though I'm ditzy enough that I'll refer to this stuff in the story, completely forgetting that some people don't read _everything_ an author writes. (I'm just a little weird in that I do...)

Query. I heard somewhere people nod their heads in Japan to show disagreement, not agreement. Fact or fiction?

Summary: How did Mischa come to be a hogosha anyway? Hints dropped in _One Wish_ fully revealed on a train bound for Tokyo.

Disclaimer: OCs from _One Wish_. Please do not borrow without permission.

**Death Rides the Railways**

Trains, she decided, -and the people who rode them- _stank_.

She was glad she had bought train tickets for her human day. The stench was overwhelming enough that she probably would have passed out had she been in her usual hanyou form.

She stared gloomily out the window.

She had gotten what she wanted, hadn't she? Escape from the hellhole she had been born into, the taunts, the teases, the threats, the beatings... She imagined she would miss her mother, but not the rest of them. Not really. What place did a half-human have among youkai?

She wasn't too sure what she expected from Tokyo. University had primarily been an excuse to leave, but her mother had looked so happy to hear that she would be furthering her education into something that wasn't solely youkai. No hiding, no violence, and a graduation requirement of a speech course. Her mother, in her prim fashion, had been _thrilled_.

She hadn't pointed out she had little intention in finishing the first semester, much less actually graduating.

Someone settled into the seat beside her. She ignored them, intent on staring out the window, focusing on nothing as she continued to think upon her reasoning for being on this train.

Silence. The farm had none, a continuous bedlam of screams, laughter, running, breathing, everything. For her, everything had always seemed too loud. It came, she supposed, from her silence.

She didn't remember much before it had happened- a tall serpent picking up a screaming hanyou when everyone knew her few protectors were away. The first thing he had done was to shut her up. Voice boxes, the farm would come to learn, were a bitch to regenerate. Especially for a hanyou.

The next things he had done were more unpleasant. She frowned. She had wanted to leave half-forgotten memories behind her, where they had happened, but it seemed that was not going to happen.

The ruined voice box meant an inability to vocalize needs, wants, complaints. She had grown adept in speaking with her body- a kind of stuttering in the youkai tongue. She had grown even more adept in watching, learning what people hid behind their words- in their stance and especially in their eyes.

She never used the knowledge. No one would believe the baby hanyou had she told them what she had learned from listening, from watching.

No one except her mother, who already knew everything she would say, and Fukii, who would store the information away for blackmail or barter. Knowledge was power, for the older wolf. Though strength was power as well, and Fukii learned that too.

She could read the way her grandfather watched his young granddaughter. Fukii, when she was old enough, would take his place. She had the physical strength lesser youkai respected, and the intelligence the family heads respected. Though she didn't have much sense. She spoke too much. And the more you spoke, the less you were heard.

Her words were few, well chosen, and listened to by those smart enough to realize that she never spoke without reason.

After all, it hurt to speak. The regeneration of her voice box would never be complete. Each syllable, each word, each sentence that fell from her lips, the pain grew worse. The longer her silence, the more the pain receded. It disappeared entirely on days like today, when she was human.

So she spoke through her body for everyday use. 'Quit kicking me' became a narrow glare. 'You're stupid' was a different glare, sometimes a rolling of the eyes. 'Are you coming?' was a half step away, a turn of the body, a tilt of the head, a question in her eyes. 'Stop nagging me' was closed eyes, feigning indifference to the whole matter. 'I'm hungry' was simply finding food and eating it, without permission.

And claws running angrily down her arms, tearing whole chunks of flesh out, blood dripping freely from open wounds, was a simple 'I want to die.'

Demon blood healed the wounds quickly. She always hated being hanyou. Too human for her youkai family to accept her, too demon to ever see her human family. A test subject for a mind-manipulator in how to best hurt someone through magic they were supposedly immune to. Too youkai to ever admit to emotions, too human in having those feelings.

And when she tried on days like today, when the demon blood receded and all that was left was a lonely young human, amber light would knit together the wounds mere seconds after she opened them. Earth magic, from what she understood of the elements. The ability to grow, re-grow, create, shape. No matter how much she hated what she was, her body refused to follow through with her mind's request to stop living.

She hadn't noticed that she had been running fingers down her arm, down the paths her claws took so often.

"Amazing how quickly the wounds heal, the scars fade."

She looked up to the man beside her. Dark red hair, graying at the temple, pulled back in a short ponytail, brilliant aquamarine eyes sympathetic as they looked at her hands, cleft jaw that made him look a bit like George Clooney.

She had never met him, but recognized enough of his facial features to realize it had been his son that had stopped the serpent youkai.

She didn't like it when powerful youkai went out of their way to speak with her. It was never good news. "What are you talking about?"

He continued on as if he hadn't heard her. Even considering how quiet her voice was, she knew he had heard her. "It does not work on days like today either. For all that the mind has no will to live, the body continues to hold it captive."

He was speaking of the very same thing she had been thinking about. She didn't think he was telepathic, but she wouldn't put it past him either. Why was he talking to her, though? She wasn't under his jurisdiction. She was quiet for a long time, then asked, "What do you want?"

"How long after reaching Tokyo do you plan on throwing yourself into traffic and causing a mess?"

She glared. It wasn't something to joke about.

His smile didn't reach his eyes. "If I gave you something to live for, would you stop?"

Easily translated. 'I have a favor to ask, but I am hesitant to ask, if you plan on dying before you do as I ask.' She debated telling him what he could do with his 'something to live for,' but crassness was par for the course for a kitsune and she didn't feel like sinking to his level about it.

His smile disappeared, replaced by a look she was very familiar with. 'I am older, wiser, and much more powerful than you can even hope to become, and you disgust me.' Usually it was aimed at her when newcomers smelled the human blood, but his look said the disgust was for something else. For that part of her that kept trying to run away from everything. It was mildly discomforting coming from Inu-Yasha and her mother. It was painful bordering on lethal from the ancient youkai narrowing his eyes to glare at her.

"Maybe they let you get away with that behavior, or maybe they were all too stupid to catch on, but hell if I am going to lose anyone on my watch to suicide."

Tokyo was his jurisdiction. While still in the North's territory, she was bound for the South. Obviously he was making sure if she was going to do something stupid, it would be while she was the North's problem. And she had no intention of returning, which meant he had to convince her- without using anything more powerful than a kitsune's natural gift of persuasion- not to do said stupid thing while she was under his protection.

No matter that she was hanyou, she was a part of the North's family and the Lady of the North would be very upset if something happened to any of her blood while visiting someone else's territory. So him being here had nothing to do with her and everything to do with the blood that was currently in recession.

So what was his argument for life, before she decided to make his life a hassle just for the hell of it? "And what would you have me live for?"

"To begin with, revenge." A human would miss the flash of startled pain that she knew showed up on her face, but he wouldn't have. What did he know about what had happened to her? "All I ask in return is that you live, and that you keep one eye, preferably two, on this junior high student."

He pulled a photograph from out of his suit jacket and handed it to her. Giving him a 'what drugs are you on that would make you think I'd babysit someone as my reason to continue breathing?' look, she looked down at the photograph. And promptly stopped breathing.

There was a long silence as she stared at the cheerful teenager grinning out of the photograph at her. Wavy black hair looked almost blue in the sunlight, eyes closed to allow for a wider smile, and one hand held upwards in a frozen wave. Trade that happy face for a blank one, and the green and white fuku for an oversized brown polo and khaki pants, and she was looking at herself. As a human, anyway.

She looked up from the photograph at the kitsune whose grin had returned. "She's-"

Had his teeth been any brighter, she probably would have seen her reflection in them. "The resemblance is uncanny, no?"

"Who?"

"One of your cousins."

Kouga, left with Ayame and Fukii to meet with Tsukikage, weeks gone. Father, meeting in Kyoto with Sesshoumaru, left days ago. Mother, gone to Tokyo to help her sister with a troubled pregnancy, not due back until after the birth. A clawed hand reaching down to pull her up by her ponytail, other hand grabbing small legs as she tries to kick him away.

_-"No one cares about you now."-_

Smiling at her from the picture, the child that pregnancy had resulted in. Staring angrily back at the smile, the abandoned daughter who had had to live through three months of poking, prodding, bleeding, burning, before anyone even cared enough to investigate the whimpering noises she could make. Seated beside her, the grandfather of the child who had found her.

It would make for a very awkward conversation, the coincidences life dealt you.

"No."

"She is a miko, even more powerful than your mother." Which didn't say much. Her mother's power lay in her control of her Sight. "But she has no one to protect her, unlike your mother."

She wanted to yell, 'And who was there to protect me?' She didn't, but he could read it easily in the angry hurt glare she gave him.

"She is just as attached to family as Tsukikage is. And for all that she is a miko, she seems not to mind what blood someone has."

Read between the lines. You guard her, she will always be there for you. Miko meant accepting someone as innocent until proven guilty. Young teenager meant hanging out with an older cousin would either be cool and done all the time or else stupid and evaded through girlish wiles.

It was her fault she was like this in the first place. And now she was being asked to keep an eye on her? An eye certainly, but she wouldn't raise a hand to keep the chit out of trouble.

She had forgotten he read body language better than she could control hers. "That is a very unfriendly gleam in your eye, young one. You might learn something from her. How to smile, for example."

Play nice or I will hurt you. Meaning caught loud and clear. Agreement struck- she would watch the girl, make sure no one bothered her. But she was still stubborn enough to not get her out of the little problems.

The interplay between words and body language was a study even an immortal could never learn entirely. He accepted her terms and the conversation changed. "Have you ever heard of something called a hogosha?"

It was a strange change in topic, however. Except hogosha meant protector. The change in topic was suddenly merely a continuation. She shook her head in disagreement.

"Hogosha, I am sure you know, means protector. But for youkai, it is something else entirely. It is a youkai chosen to guard a human." He caught the question in her eyes. "The human is usually a guardian of a demon artifact. The guardian protects the artifact, the hogosha protects the guardian."

And just why would someone barely old enough to have her menses be a guardian?

"Even I could not explain how artifacts choose their guardians. I merely see when an artifact loses one and chooses another. Sometimes the transfer is not that smooth. Guardians can be forced to renounce what they watch, and give it up to someone else. Usually right before that someone else kills the guardian, since even with the renunciation, the artifact stays with its guardian until their death."

Short life span. This was beginning to look interesting.

She could tell that he was telling himself he should have known that was what she would catch on to.

"A human guardian has a youkai hogosha."

And the smugness she felt in catching him unawares deflated. Youkai. She was hanyou. Her fingers returned to tracing invisible scars on her arm.

"Stop that. I am the taiyoukai of the South, the senior of all the lords. What I say, goes. And if anyone has a problem with me naming a hanyou hogosha, they will answer to me and then to their god."

Over the top, like all kitsune statements, but reassuring in a completely disturbing fashion. And now his presence had driven her to oxymorons. Wonderful.

"Besides, you have other abilities to make up for the fact that a hogosha is normally a magician."

His smile was entirely too malicious for her to think anything good about his reassurance. It was always a good time to die, why not go out with a fight? It would certainly reassure Inu-Yasha that his student wasn't suicidal, the moron.

The kitsune was right in that everyone either didn't care or was too stupid to see what she did. Only her mother, but she knew enough to know what her daughter was doing to herself wouldn't kill her. Physically, anyway.

"Fine."

He knew the reason why she had accepted it. If guardians protected their charges until death, that meant that there was someone out there who wanted to shorten that time period. And she was agreeing to stand between that person and the guardian. Maybe she'd get lucky and get herself killed. Some said death was the beginning, but it wasn't. Dead was dead, the end. And she wanted an end.

At least this way she'd go out with a bang, show them that she existed and wouldn't take their shit anymore.

"Give me your hand."

Tactile contact with youkai. Another unpleasant feeling. Live for revenge, kill the serpent for making her physically sick every time a demon touched her. She hated magicians.

She gave him her hand.

After he released it, she didn't feel any different and eyed him quizzically.

"Check the mirror tomorrow, little one. No hogosha is a hogosha without a symbol of their duty." Something in his words gave her the impression that the duty came before suicide and that whatever it was he had done, it would keep her from clawing her arms up anymore.

She couldn't care enough to glare at him as he got up and walked down the empty aisle to disappear into the next railcar.


	5. Side Story: A Day In The Life

AN: A deleted set of scenes, from when Eri kidnapped Kagome to go shopping. Takes place between chapters eight and nine. Also answers the question of how Mischa found out about Matsuro working for Kino. (Though it never comes out and directly says that.)

Disclaimer: Kagome and Eri courtesy of Rumiko Takahashi. Matsuro, Chame, and Mischa products of a deranged mind and not for sale. (Though borrowing with permission is allowed.)

**A Day In The Life**

It seemed to Kagome that it had been months since she had managed to relax and simply enjoy the pleasure of being a normal human without a care besides passing organic chemistry and getting attention of the cute soccer player Souta liked to hang out with.

Admittedly, she had gotten over that crush years ago, but the scar made him look decidedly bad, and like all women, Kagome adored the idea of getting attention from a handsome man who walked the borderline between good and evil.

Eri's cooing over a chic fuzzy sweater brought her back to reality.

"It's adorable, Kagome-chan! And look, robin's egg blue. I love that color. Mamoru-san says it's a good contrast to my eyes."

Privately, Kagome thought every color in the rainbow would be a good contrast for her friend's dark eyes.

"It's very stylish, Eri-chan. And yes, it does look good with your eyes. It wouldn't with mine, but I prefer darker blues."

"You really shouldn't wear blue, Kagome-chan, unless it' picked very properly. Otherwise it makes your eyes look wishy-washy."

Kagome grinned back over the rack at her short-haired friend. "That's why I prefer darker shades of blue. They make my eyes look pretty much gray."

"Only you, Kagome-chan, would rather have gray eyes than blue."

"Hey, after having to see Mischa's eyes all the time, I've given up on making my eyes look blue. It always makes me look off, not to mention it accentuates the fact we're practically identical twins," Kagome said.

Eri giggled.

"What's so funny?"

"Well, you like guys, right?"

Kagome was startled by the question and could only nod.

"If you and Meirin-sempai were really identical twins, wouldn't you say that she'd have the same sexual preferences?"

The clothes slipped from her hands to go back to swinging off their hangers on the rack. "You think Mischa's interested in girls?" Kagome wasn't sure whether to start laughing or to double-check and make sure Mischa wasn't anywhere around and take cover when shoes suddenly started being thrown at her friend.

Eri giggled again. "I did for awhile. And I even squirreled up the courage to ask her about it."

Kagome's eyes grew wider. "You didn't."

Eri waved a hand- still laden with hangers of clothes to try on- without concern. "After being glared into a puddle of Eri-mud for being so impertinent as to ask a personal question of Her Royal Silentness, Meirin-sempai, she said she had absolutely no preference either way, as neither appealed to her."

Kagome decided that since her friend had obviously lived through the dangerous encounter, it was safe to joke around about it. "Is that a direct quote?"

"Nah. But it's so hard to remember what she says, I just translated it for you."

Kagome gave up on trying to look through clothes. Eri's story looked to be much more interesting. "Did she ask why you asked?"

Eri gave her a horrible impression of Mischa's 'you are stupid for asking that' glare. Kagome proved her immunity by sticking her tongue out at her friend, who grinned back. "She didn't _ask_, of course. But I knew she was thinking about it. So I told her it's because the only people she really talks to outside of her work and school seem to be just you and me. Guess what she did."

Kagome had heard it from Mischa upon occasion, whenever Kagome wondered aloud how Mischa could handle being in Kagome's talkative friend's presence. "Snorted and said you talked to her, not she talked to you?"

Eri pretended to look shocked. "And you didn't even need to think about it." She grabbed Kagome's arm with her free hand and dragged her back to the changing room.

Kagome struggled to keep from falling as her friend expertly navigated tiny openings between racks of clothes. After they had made it to their destination, Eri disappeared into one of the dressing stalls and Kagome leaned against the wall on the other side of the door. She raised her voice to let her be heard through the door. "She's not very tactful, but I told her if she wouldn't make friends, she would just be stuck with me."

There was a rustle of fabric from behind the door. "Oooh, I wonder if she whimpered when she heard that? We're not really the quietest bunch, are we?" Eri said in a muffled voice, and Kagome could faintly hear her snicker.

Kagome snickered as well. "No we aren't. She didn't whimper either. She just sighed melodramatically and started ignoring me. But you notice how she does actually talk to you now?"

"Oh, so she talks to me because you told her to. More proof to me that, if she was aware of hormones, they'd be thinking about you."

"I prefer men."

"We already agreed on that. But I wasn't talking about you, I was talking about Meirin-sempai. Anyways, when I pointed out that she still hadn't explained why she talked to you and that she really must like you since she did, you know what she said?"

"To be honest? I don't think she answered at all. Just given you that look and walked off."

"Yeah, I was sort of expecting that too. But she spoke! And I think I'll hear those words until the day I die."

Ne, Eri-chan, you're a business major, not theater."

Eri's head poked out of the door, and the rest of her followed close after. "I'm quite serious, Kagome-chan. She said, and I quote, 'Kurosawa-san, everyone loves Kagome.' And then she gave me that look and walked off."

Kagome was silent for awhile, staring at her friend. Suddenly, Eri's story was so much as humorous as it was unsettling. "So why are you going to remember it forever?" she asked as her friend skipped over to the partitioned mirror to see what the faults were in the outfit she had picked out.

Eri made eye contact with her through the mirror. "Because it was such a surprise that it got me thinking. And she's right, Kagome-chan. Everyone loves you. And don't even think about interrupting," she added as Kagome opened her mouth to disagree. "I'm not done. I thought about this a lot. And why, you wonder, do we think everyone loves you? Quite simply, because you love everyone."

"Ne, Eri-chan, I think you're a few columns short of a spreadsheet."

Eri wordlessly replied by turning around and giving her friend a bear hug that left her gasping for breath.

Regaining use of her lungs, Kagome said weakly, "What was that for?"

Eri giggled. "See what I mean? You tailored your insult for me." She grinned at Kagome's half-hearted glare. "But seriously, Kagome-chan, you do. And if you think about it, you'll see it too."

"I think you're making the entire thing up. Including what Mischa said. Because she wouldn't say it."

Eri's eyes lit in malicious humor, and she eyed the returned clothes rack beside Kagome. Kagome turned her head and followed her friend's gaze. A hideous arrangement of colors better found on sherbert ice cream was spread across the bar. Kagome looked back at her friend, half morbidly curious and half terrified.

The girl's grin took on the same malicious look as her eyes. "Let's make a bet then, shall we? If I'm lying, you get to choose something for me to buy. If I'm telling the truth, I get to choose what you buy."

"Bring it on," Kagome said, not one to back away from challenges she walked into.

"Then whip out your trusty cell phone and call your silent cousin then."

**-----**

The sudden vibrating of her cell phone distracted Mischa from the stammering tiger youkai in front of her, and he took the unexpected chance to run for it.

Still glaring at the phone number, she flipped the chair he had been cowering on into the air. The chair broke against the youkai's legs, and he crumpled to the ground. She further compounded his lack of movement by quickly moving to stand on him- his back making sickening cracks as she sadistically jumped up and down a few times, testing the steadiness of her unfortunate perch. After his scream of pain stopped, she pressed the answer button.

"Yes?" she said in a low, curt voice.

There was a pause for a time, and she unceremoniously took her head away from the phone and ended the conversation. She returned the phone to her pocket as she looked down to take in her captive prey.

The tiger youkai she stood on was already beginning to mend his broken bones, and started struggling. In a quick flurry of movement she had him held up by the neck, her greater height leaving his feet dangling close to a foot off the ground. Asphyxiation was not lethal to youkai, but it still was very discomforting.

"Shinin, you say, works for a great dragon. And this great dragon seeks the power of the taiyoukai and, through them, the gods. I am not inclined to believe you."

"It's true," he managed to croak out, claws scraping her wrists were she held him. She didn't look as though she noticed she was close to having her entire hand cut off.

She released some of the power in her hold to let him breathe more easily. "What proof do you have?"

"Shinin reports to him almost daily."

"There are such things as shapeshifters."

"Like that hentai would be caught dead looking like the great dragon. He wants sex, not people cowering from him because he's taken the form of the greatest youkai ever to live."

She eyed him shrewdly. "You know this shapeshifter then?"

"He isn't around much. Spying on the opposite side, you know."

She was silent as she stared at him impassively.

"Humans seem to want to trust the people they sleep with. Of course, what the great dragon has him watching now is a miko." The malicious grin that spread across his face told him he knew who she was. "Of course, no one knows how your miko mother managed to not kill your traitorous father to get fat with you. There isn't another youkai alive who would risk getting purified just for a bad lay. Maybe it's you he's fucking right now. He doesn't care what he fucks, so long as he gets what he wants out of the deal."

There was a sickening crunch as she lost control of her temper.

The dark-haired tiger's mouth was still twisted in a rictus of a grin in death.

"I hate cats." Her glare narrowed further as she let the body drop, uncaring of who found it.

**-----**

Matsuro nearly jumped out of his skin when the low beeping noise started.

Mostly because his cell phone didn't make that noise. It was on vibrate. Which led to wonderful comments, but he was too busy trying to figure out who Higurashi Kagome would be calling while she was out with friends.

And if this was someone else's phone, who had his?

And then he knew. In the scuffle, they both had dropped their phones and had carelessly picked them up. He hadn't bothered to check that it was his, and, as she hadn't glared hers back from him, neither had she.

"If it weren't for bad luck," he told the ringing phone, "I'd have no luck at all."

He concentrated on his vocal cords. "Testing, one, two, three," he said in a low-pitched alto.

Perfect as always, he thought with a grin. He hit the answer button. "Yes?"

There was a slight pause and his face shifted into a grin. Hopefully he would be able to keep that smile out of his voice, he thought, rolling his eyes.

"Kags, who wouldn't love you?"

Amazingly enough, the line went dead from her end.

He snickered. Let the wolf try to get out of that ensuing bursts of screaming once her cousin found her.

**-----**

"Ne, Kagome-chan, I know that look on your face. It says I'm right and you're wrong," her companion said gleefully.

"Gobsmacked," Kagome finally said.

"Ne, you've been reading too much Harry Potter if you can't find a better adjective to express abject horror and traumatizing shock."

"Eri-chan, after I finish killing Mischa-"

"And buying whatever it is I wish of you," Eri interrupted.

Kagome pretended to not notice the interruption. "I am going to tell Yuka-chan about you trying to seduce Hojo-kun away from her back in senior year."

"Kagome-chan!" Her friend shrieked. "I was drunk!"

Kagome gave her friend the same malicious smirk she had been given minutes ago. "Then you sure as hell aren't going to make me waste my money on those monstrosities," she said, pointing at the discarded clothes beside her.

Eri glared. Kagome glared right back. But Eri didn't study the ruthless business world for nothing. "Then why don't we go look for something not too dreadful?"

-----

Mischa twirled the phone in her hands, wondering how best to approach the redhead. Or if ignoring him would be the better option.

She sneezed. There was a giggle from behind her.

"Trouble," she said.

"Hiya, Kage! Sorry about that, I've gotten so used to wearing that suggestion, I'd forgotten to take it down when I came in."

Mischa gave her standard 'you are stupid' look, and returned her attention to the phone.

"That looks like niisan's phone," the kitsune chirped as she hopped onto the back of Mischa's chair to peer over her shoulder. Mischa evaded the hand meant to lean on the side of her head for balance and it dropped to her cloth-covered shoulder without the kitsune ever realizing the movement.

"It was in my pocket," the blue-eyed woman said, before internally wincing as she realized what Chame could do with what she said.

"And what else of niisan's things have been in your pockets, Kage?" the kitsune asked mischievously.

Mischa shifted slightly where she sat, and the kitsune lost her balance and fell forwards, tumbling to the ground at Mischa's feet.

"Unfortunately, it has only been the phone so far," Matsuro said, entering the room.

Chame snickered, but refrained from comment. Mischa tossed the phone at the redhead and gave him an expectant look.

He grinned. "Would you like me to return your phone to where-"

"Just hand it over, pervert," she said, not giving him time to complete the offer.

He sighed dramatically, kicked his sister in an unspoken order to quit laying around on the floor- something she liked to do- and dropped a different cell phone into Mischa's hands.

As Chame scowled and got off the floor, he said with a grin, "Your miko called."

Before letting her eyes ask a question she wouldn't voice, Matsuro moved around the chair and into the kitchen, intent on raiding the Higurashi's refrigerator. Chame skipped merrily after him, after sticking her tongue out at Mischa.

Mischa continued to twirl the cell phone in her hands, still wondering what she would do with the information she had unexpectedly gotten.

**-----**

Kagome poked her cousin in the arm. The woman was even more taciturn than normal.

"Ne, Mischa, you haven't explained your words from earlier," Kagome said.

The woman paused, chopsticks in mouth, to give her cousin a look, then returned to eating her dinner as fast as was politely and neatly possible.

Kagome sighed. Her cousin always ate like it was either her last meal or she had never had one before in her life. "You know," she said, twirling her chopsticks in the air, "how no one could not love me? Eri tricked me into buying a hideous coat because I was sure you wouldn't say anything like that. No offense," she went on hurriedly, "but saying something like that, especially to Eri-chan, is completely unlike you."

Mischa continued to eat.

Kagome huffed. Definitely much quieter than normal. Rudely so.

"It is true," the woman finally said, after sipping her tea. Kagome looked about to object to the lack of explanation, but Mischa gave her a look that told Kagome if she thought about it long enough, she'd figure it out.

Since Mischa obviously wasn't going to be any more forthcoming on the subject, Kagome decided to change the subject. "So what's gotten you so grumpy?"

Kagome wasn't surprised that Mischa went from quickly eating her food to suddenly having no food to eat. Nor was she surprised when Mischa disappeared in a brown blur from the low table. Disappointed, perhaps, but not surprised. Mischa was usually honest, but the balance for that honesty was her preference to not give answers at all.

"Now what am I supposed to do with that stupid coat?" she asked the empty place setting.

Well, black was close to brown. Maybe Mischa would trade in her gray oversized Tokyo U. sweater for a black fitted pea coat. It wasn't as if her cousin paid attention to fashions and wouldn't care if more fashionable people like her would find it an eyesore.

And it wasn't as if it wasn't Kagome who talked the usually monochromatic veterinary student into the sweater first place.


	6. Outtake: Crime and Punishment

AN: I have way too much fun trying to figure out my kitsunes' personalities. They're the most human of all youkai, besides the whole 'they are their own yin and yang' thing that all of them have. Yet more irrelevancy, as a break from the seriousness _One Wish _is falling into. I would like to point out that any relationship between Mischa and Matsuro is platonic at best. Matsuro just happens to be a hornykitsune, and wouldgive his grandmother the once-over.

Summary: A third-person point of view of why to give a kitsune child what she wants. Mischa learns the hard way not to say "no" to Chame and Kagome is proven right that Mischa would look stellar in red. Matsuro learns to be subtler about trying to check out someone with heightened senses.

Disclaimer: OCs from _One Wish_. If you don't recognize them, how'd you find this story in the first place?

**Crime and Punishment**

He had been working on her most of the evening. The fun was in the chase, in making them ask you, not you them. And the key to that was making them feel like they were the center of your universe, that you revolved around them and could see nothing else.

So he was mildly surprised when she paused mid-sentence to watch a small child make her way across the bar to the pair sitting at the cozily darkened booth.

He knew it was Chame- his little sister may have shifted form, but she had kept her characteristic long dark braid. Though those violet eyes she had were telling him she was pulling a prank and he was part of it.

She tugged on his shirtsleeve as she finally reached him, as if she hadn't already gotten his attention. "Mommy's mad at you," the child whispered confidentially, very much loud enough for the woman sitting across the table to hear.

Or he was the brunt of the joke. She had changed her form to have his eyes. He couldn't wait to see whom she had tricked into playing 'Mommy.'

"Do I know you?" he asked, hoping his startled companion might believe him.

Chame pretended she hadn't heard the question. "She's called your office every night this week, and they told her you've been taking off early every night."

Oh shit. Tablemate suddenly very unhappy as she realizes that he probably fed the 'you're my whole world' look to every pretty face.

Might as well try to keep the damage low.

"I'm really not her father," he explained quickly to the pretty brunette. "She's my kid sister."

Anger dimming down- the resemblance is there, even if he's a redhead and she's got black hair. "Oh, I see," she said in a friendly manner. "But that still doesn't explain why she's here."

Or maybe she was still suspicious. That wasn't good.

"I'm trying to warn him before Mommy finds him," the aggravating kit told the brunette as she hopped up to take her favorite position of being a few tendons too weak to actually strangle him, but still enough of a deadweight to hang around his neck like an albatross. He really should stop giving her piggyback rides.

The door to the bar slammed open. All heads turned to look at the angry newcomer. Chame took the opportunity to stifle a snicker in his shoulder. He usually found this sort of thing amusing, but not when it was being played on him by a kit less than half his age.

Dark hair was pulled out of its usual ponytail, swirling about her like a short cape, dark eyes searching the room for someone she knew had to be there. Her usual brown clothes were gone in favor of a rather stunning sleeveless, likely backless, shimmery red cocktail dress that stopped a good deal above mid thigh. The sneakers and the sparkle of magic that clung to the dress told him precisely why she was in a murderous rage. Chame's illusions had the ability to become reality, should she so choose it. And she had chosen it and led the angry ex-hanyou right to him.

Matsuro would have been much more appreciative of the dress if his little sister and his suddenly drab-looking table companion hadn't been there, or if she hadn't looked three seconds away from killing anyone who even looked at her wrong.

He felt like sinking into the floor. His red hair always brought him attention, and right now, he didn't want hers, not with that angry 'death awaits you all' glare on her face. Especially after she heard the appreciative wolf whistles from some of the more inebriated patrons.

And when she finally caught sight of him- leaning slightly forward in his chair to accommodate the additional weight of a kit who was always wanting to be held, eyes wide with surprise as his glance flickered between her and the woman he had been hitting on, and feeling slightly, _insanely_ guilty for being here at all- her eyes narrowed even further. At first he thought it was directed at him, then he remembered Chame's chin tucked on his shoulder.

He didn't think highly enough of his little sister to stand between her and a woman who knew eight different ways to vivisect a man in under five seconds.

"What the hell did you do?" he asked as Mischa strode purposefully across the room towards them, expertly subtly dodging grabs for her skirted posterior and fisted hands.

"Your sister, huh?" the woman said scornfully. "Gods, but you must think I'm really stupid to buy that. All men are pigs." She stood and stormed off, giving Mischa a sympathetic look as they passed each other. Mischa's eyes almost looked puzzled.

The confusion lasted long enough for one bold drunk to grab onto a wrist to try and pull her into his lap. She let the wrist be dragged in closer, and there was a sickening crunch he was sure even the humans could hear as her hand- still much too strong for a normal human- closed around his crotch and twisted.

He collapsed groaning and her way to Matsuro's table was immediately cleared.

"What I can do for you?" Matsuro asked calmly as she stopped in front of him. He fought an urge to turn tail and flee or else get into a defensive stance in preparation for the beating she was promising the barnacle clinging to his shoulders.

Death awaited all but the kitsune fast enough to outrun a pretty dark-haired girl who continually came in first in every track meet she competed in. Now if only he could detach his sister from his neck to keep Mischa distracted long enough for him to disappear.

"Here, let me take that for you," she snarled. Chame clung tighter as Mischa pulled the smaller kitsune up by the back of her shirt. His shirt didn't seem to be made of such stern stuff, and he gave a soft sigh as fabric tore and the girl was lifted to eye-level for the irate earth elementalist.

He wisely said nothing, while Chame clung to the torn material and made a pitiful whimper as she realized she wasn't getting away that easily.

"This is not funny," Mischa ground out at the small kitsune who was madly grinning, half-amused and half-terrified, at the human. "Nor is your form."

She had obviously seen the purple eyes and blue highlights in the usually green-highlighted black hair. Maybe if he was very still, she'd completely forget he was there.

"And don't think you're getting out of this either, red," she told him as he started inching towards an escape route. He didn't want to know what she was going to blame him for. Maybe for patroning bars of ill repute that made her become the eyeful of the day. The man was still groaning. He had no interest in becoming victim number two, so long as she was in that violent of a mood. Maybe once she calmed down a little, he'd...

"And get that ridiculous look off your face. You're not my type."

But that meant she had one. And if she did, he could find it out. Once he planned Chame's funeral arrangements.

"Pay your tab. You're leaving."

"Muuuushaaaa," the kit wailed as Matsuro eyed the woman, then nodded. He could argue about humans bossing youkai around later. "It was just a joke!"

One eye on Matsuro, Mischa hefted the wailing kit across her shoulder like a jacket and stormed back out. Everyone's eyes were wisely elsewhere- besides Matsuro, who had the luck of walking behind her and discovering that, yes, the dress did indeed have no back.

"I'm not laughing," she said coldly.

Matsuro would be, just as soon as he got out of hearing distance of her. He'd give anything to know how Chame had managed to get the illusion-to-reality spell to work without Mischa becoming aware of it. It usually required a great deal of contact with the substance being changed, and the ex-hanyou was very adept in avoiding someone's touch.

Although, given that he had noticed she was a sucker for big eyes and a cute pout, she had likely fallen prey to the same problem he had. Chame was just too cute to say 'no' to when she wanted a piggyback ride.

Though, judging by the whimpering and the pained look Chame was giving him as the bar door swung shut behind them, she wouldn't be pulling this prank again any time soon. Which was a real shame, because that dress looked absolutely wonderful.

Matsuro was torn between watching the dress's hemline rise and fall with each stride the woman in front of him took or making a quick getaway and leaving his sister to her deserved fate.

Mischa sent Chame flying right into a nearby car and spun, neatly hitting him in an uncomfortable spot with her knee. His eyes crossed and he doubled over with a groan.

Chame's loud complaint about being thrown against the side of the van with no respect for property damage muffled his low swearing. Mischa ignored both.

"I haven't spent twenty years hiding from people not to know when someone's looking at me and where they're looking. You can go now. You can have what remains of your sister when I'm done with her," she told him.

Chame gave up on playing the victim and shifted form into that of a bird and took off.

"Damn it."

And he was left alone in the parking lot, still groaning in pain, wondering how these things happened to him when it came to women who weren't just casual acquaintances. Yet another reason why never to get into a deeper relationship than one-night stands.


	7. Side Story: Higher Level Education

AN: How some of the characters met- namely Souta, Mischa, and Yoshi. Set six years before _One Wish_. Focused primarily on Souta, interspersed with moody hanyou, soccer-playing air elementalists, and oden-eating mikos. (Yes, I know Japanese doesn't have plural, but hell if it's always been one miko, two mikos in my mind. Two miko sounds wrong.) Character development for a younger Souta- how he came to be so easily accepting of weird things- and a younger Mischa- how she'll look out for family, even if she won't admit to it.

Disclaimer: Kagome and Souta courtesy of Rumiko Takahashi. Yoshi and Mischa products of a deranged mind and not for sale. (Though borrowing with permission is allowed.)

**Higher-Level Education**

Souta liked to think the world was a cool place to live. Of course, there were also things about that he didn't like. Take school, for instance. School was boring; the only thing good about it was recess, lunch, and gym class. All nine-year-olds saw things like that.

His mother, however, didn't see things like that and had delivered an ultimatum. Either stop bringing home notes for parent-teacher conferences to discuss his lack of initiative, or else get real used to never playing soccer after school again.

It should have been an easy choice. Souta loved soccer. Lived for soccer. It a world of cool things, soccer rated number two- right behind reading, preferably manga or Kagome's science books.

So it should have been an easy choice. But school was beyond boring, and of course he didn't do the homework so stupid that even the dumb students got perfect scores on them. They were a waste of his time, better spent on the soccer field down the street with the other boys. Maybe if the work had been halfway interesting, like about rocketry, or biochemistry, he would do the work.

But he hadn't done the work, and his mother's threat became reality.

She spoke to the soccer coach, and today, for the fifth game straight- three whole weeks! - he was exiled to the spectators' side of the field, watching his teammates lose badly without their main goalkeeper playing. The girl beside him thought the game was going so badly she had pulled out a big book and started reading.

Which reminded him of his repossessed manga, currently wiling away its time in a cardboard box in Kagome's closet. Not allowed to do anything but homework, besides coming to the fields for practice, which his mother had agreed was beneficial to his health and kept him in good shape. The argument hadn't gone quite as well as he hoped, but at least he was sulking outside and not in his room.

Watching the game, Souta got the feeling that even if the homework was so stupid he could do it in his sleep, he better do it. Because people shouldn't bring books to soccer games. He craned his neck, trying to read the page to see what her book was about.

It wasn't really so much as text as it was photographs. Eww, he would never try to cut Buyo's fur again if that was what a hairless cat looked like. He looked away from the photograph and at the girl, who was staring at him out of the corner of her eye.

She didn't look much older than him, so he figured she must only be in her first year of junior high. Kagome started bringing home big books like that when she started going there too. Though those weren't as interesting as this, not after he realized the only thing the books were really teaching his sharp mind was the proper names for things, as logic dictated the way they worked.

"Do you always read over other people's shoulders?"

He shrugged. "Just wanted to know what you were reading."

"It's an anatomy book. Why don't you go back to watching the game before I rearrange yours?" she asked, giving a mean glare that made her blue eyes so dark they were practically purple.

"It's boring to watch. And coach won't let me play until my teacher says my grades are improving. Tell me all about the cat," he demanded with all the importance a nine-year-old could.

She turned her head to stare right at him, and he was reminded again of his sister. She looked an awful lot like Kagome. Only with a grumpier face. But she was seeing _him_, and not the annoying little kid who kept Kagome home on weeknights to babysit, so it was all right for her to look grumpy.

He had discovered early on that nobody could resist the puppy dog eyes but a mother. She wasn't one.

She sighed. "Fine. Let's start with the basics..."

**-----**

Kagome watched Souta trot towards the house from her window. She could almost hear his tuneless whistling.

Wasn't he grounded? What was he so happy about? Had the soccer coach actually let him play?

"Tadaima!" he announced cheerfully from downstairs, shoes dropping to the floor loudly, and then he was thundering up the stairs, dashing into her room, grabbing the no-longer-napping cat on her bed, then disappearing back out.

Kagome waited until the papers on her desk stopped moving before following.

"Okay, you little runt, what are you so happy about?" she asked, poking her head through his doorway.

"I was talking with this girl at the game," he said, looking up from where he had been petting the cat, "and she said that it takes at least three feet for a cat to be able to twist around to land on its feet, and for anything above five stories, they can't do it at all."

"You're not throwing my cat out the window," she said flatly.

"No, no, no! I grabbed Buyo to see if he really was a cat, because I've _never_ seen him land on his feet, and she loaned me this book that has all these cool pictures, and if Buyo is a cat, he should look something like they do-"

Kagome tuned the excited babble out and turned her attention to the large book Souta had beside him.

Who would bring homework to a soccer game?

She shook her head and sighed. "You still have to do your homework, Souta."

He hummed noncommittally, grabbing Buyo and twisting the cat around so he could feel along the cat's back, mouthing numbers as he counted ribs underneath all the fat.

She gave him another long look before closing the door and heading back to her room.

Who would bring homework to a soccer game and how had they managed to interest her 'I hate everything but soccer' little brother in it?

**-----**

"Ne, bookworm, do you come here every day?" he asked, plopping down beside the girl, exhausted from practice.

"It's Shan, not bookworm. I was waiting for you. I'd like my book back," she told him.

"But I've still got another four chapters to go!" he complained.

So this was what they meant by silence being loud, he thought, shifting under her incredulous gaze.

"You actually read it?" she asked slowly.

"Yeah," he said after taking a long drink from his water bottle. "The problems at the end of the chapters were kind of easy. Though they were harder than the ones in my books. Do you have to do them for homework or does your teacher make up harder ones?"

"Didn't you say your mother grounded you from soccer because you wouldn't do you homework?"

"Well, yeah, but that's because the homework's boring? I could answer that stuff in my sleep," he told her.

He thought he heard her mutter, "Then why don't you?"

"Anyways, do you have any more? Kagome took away all my manga and I need something to read."

He couldn't read her face as she replied, "Only if you answer all the questions at the back of each chapter."

"But they're easy!" he protested.

"Prove it."

If it would get him more interesting stuff to read, so be it. Maybe it would even look like homework and he would be allowed to play in his soccer games again.

"You're on."

**-----**

"I'm not joking," he overheard as he headed back downstairs to get a late-night snack. "My books are smaller than the ones he dragged home yesterday, and he's actually reading them!"

Kagome was talking on the phone to someone. About him. About the books he got from the bookworm who had come to practice to get her book back, only to end up giving him her book-laden backpack. Along with a promise that if he read it, he did all the work in it too.

"Ne, Mischa, did you talk to him after I talked to you? I didn't really mean to whine about babysitting him, you know. Souta's too cute to stay mad at for long. And I hate to admit it, but having to stay home means my homework gets done too."

He didn't pay close attention to the phone call. He was used to his sister staying up all hours of the night talking to different friends.

It looked like the work was going to be a bit of a challenge. Anatomy wasn't too hard- as an athlete, he tried to be aware of his body. She had taken her calculus book away from him, saying he could try figuring out basic algebra before taking on the real stuff. He made a mental note to find Kagome's book and borrow it as soon as possible. Possibly when she fell asleep while working on it. Maybe pass his work off as hers to make her feel better about her math scores? She tried hard, he knew, but she had no head for numbers. He was the one helping her learn the multiplication tables when they were littler.

"Mischa no baka! Don't tell me it's none of my business! Something really weird is going on!"

Ah, cup ramen. Nectar of the gods. Or would it be ambrosia? Nectar was liquid, ambrosia was solid. Cup ramen came somewhere in between. Nec-brosia? Am-tar? The microwave dinged.

Souta knew he was brilliant when it came to math and sciences, but he still slept his way through elementary school for the sole reason of not being labeled 'that dorky little smart kid' by the older children who would be his new classmates. No, sleeping his way through school was much safer.

But that didn't stop him from wishing for a challenge.

And the cute blue-eyed junior high student, with her curt lessons in basic physics and virology and whatever else happened to be the book of the week, promised a challenge. 'Learn what I'm saying or I'm not letting you borrow my books.'

"Okay, okay, so weird stuff is always going on around me. But not Souta."

Soccer was still second in his world, reading was still number one. But listening intently to the girl's quiet, low voice explain why neutrons were so much heavier than electrons had jumped from not even being on the list, to being the third coolest thing the world had to offer.

He slurped from the cup, foregoing chopsticks.

**-----**

The older teenagers had scared the children into vacating one of the two fields and had set up a very physical, no-holds-barred, no-such-thing-as-fouls game. One left the field for a water break, and noticed a young girl reading, half-watching the younger kids play.

He cocked his head to the side and watched her for a time. Just looking at her made it painfully obvious about the duality of her nature. He headed in her direction.

"It's an odd place to find someone like you," the teen said as he sat down next her.

She hummed in recognition of his presence, but continued to read.

"So do you just like soccer or is he dinner?"

Her head snapped up so fast he worried she might have gotten whiplash.

"Why do you look so surprised? There _are_ humans who know about your kind," he said with a smirk playing across his handsome, scarred face.

She threw the book in his face and stormed off.

**-----**

It had taken him only four months, and constant badgering to the unsympathetic book girl, but he had finished all the questions, read all the books she had on the physical sciences. She ignored his pleas for more books at once, loaning him only one or two at a time and not giving him new ones until the work was done for those. He wondered where she got the textbooks and what she did with the ream of papers he gave her every Friday as proof he was actually reading the book.

A month into the lessons, his mother had agreed to let him go back to playing in his soccer games and not just getting exercise at soccer practice.

Shan had stopped coming every day after a few weeks of his constant badgering. He decided she was slightly masochistic, as she continued to show up every Friday for the soccer games.

He wondered why she started coming in the first place and asked when his game ended and the team was sent on its way.

"My cousin plays," she explained, waving in the direction of the other soccer field, where a group of teenagers were playing an unofficial game.

"Does that mean you know how to play too?"

She shook her head. "I just know what I've seen."

"Then it's my turn to do you a favor." He pulled her over to the game and asked the older boys if the two children could join in.

The oldest- a scar-faced brunette with eyes two different colors- agreed before the rest of the group could laugh them off the field. He was rewarded by having both runts put on his team. He merely laughed at the newest teammates forced upon him, made Souta goalie, and handed the glowering girl a rubber band.

"Put your hair in a ponytail so it won't fly in your face. You'll see better."

The other team stopped laughing fifteen minutes into the game when it was discovered the nine-year-old was a better goalie than the kid who played goalkeeper for his high school team, and the girl, while having trouble learning how to dribble, had a powerful kick, and was small enough to send break-away attackers flipping over her as she stole the ball from under their noses.

The brunette who had let them play turned out to be an exceedingly good player and could play anywhere on the field, blending in with the other boys' talents around him, always somehow making them play better, putting a little more into the game than they thought they could.

Souta wondered why he'd never joined the bigger kids' game before, if this was all it was. Maybe because he played with his teammates, who had already left tonight, and the older boys were the only ones playing right then, and he wanted to show her _now_ what soccer was.

The boy with the different colored eyes laughed so hard he cried when the streetlights came on, signifying it was dark and time for the two little ones to head home for dinner.

"You come play again. I'll have you on my team any day."

The boy who had forced the two onto the other team scowled. The brunette just laughed harder as the kid waved farewell, before turning and trotting after the disappearing girl.

"She's got no real talent for the game, she's only naturally athletic," the scar-faced teen told the opposite side's goalie. "You just saw a little girl. Though that kid," he added with a grin, "a thousand yen says he goes pro before he's twenty. He's wasted in the goal box."

There were no takers on the bet- the teen was well known for his ability to never lose a bet he made, even if the odds were impossible.

The goalie for the other team shoved him playfully. "You're the one who told him to play there."

"He's too little to play anywhere else with you on the field. You'd break both his legs the first time he scored on you." He demonstrated what his friend's reaction would be, contorting his face into one full of outrage as a kid almost half his age scored on him, stomping around before throwing his shirt off and tackling the goalie.

The scuffle was broken up by the younger teens, worried the two were actually fighting.

"Yoshi, you're insane," the goalie said, waving away the kid still standing between the two.

Yoshi gave a noncommittal hum. "She was kinda cute," he said, grabbing his shirt to pull back on.

"Maybe when she hits puberty she'll look even better," the goalie said with a roll of his eyes.

Yoshi just started laughing again.

"Insane," the rest agreed as they decided new teams.

**-----**

The breeze ruffled his dark hair as he watched the two. Soccer practice was long over for the boy, the streetlights would be turning on soon, and neither looked like they would be getting up any time soon.

He could faintly hear their conversation, and he had to wonder. Really, why would someone like her be playing tutor to an overly bright elementary student? Actually, listening to the boy question her logic for one explanation, the boy wasn't just bright, he was a damn genius.

Still didn't explain why she would care. Unless his senses were playing him wrong- and they never did- she was part demon. They never paid much attention to mortals.

And then he saw something he should have noticed when the two had first approached him to let them play with him and his friends. But he hadn't, because he was still so shocked at coming face-to-face with a half-demon to pay any attention to the young boy with her.

Elemental magic clung to him, blending in with the pale light of magic that clung to everything and hidden by the blaze of brown and silver she was. He hadn't seen it because the boy's magic paled in comparison to the bastion of unavailable power the girl was. Had she been human, any magician who saw her would have snapped her up. Instead, she languished under the sad fact that someone who was part demon and part human would never be able to use either species' magic.

She noticed the attention he had been focusing on them and glared at him. The boy in front of he turned, recognized him, and waved. He waved back, ignoring the glare.

Now why would a half-demon care about a human, even one that had the ability to use magic?

And what was keeping him from approaching the two and teaching the kid about the world his friend couldn't teach him?

Nothing, really.

Nothing besides the flat blue glare of a girl he knew had to be approaching twenty, yet easily passing herself off as twelve.

His first few attempts to speak with her had left him wondering how anyone could think her a child, with those far-too-angry eyes. Maybe he was just going about it wrong.

**-----**

She was talking to someone who wasn't him.

It took a well-aimed soccer ball from Shinnosuke to get his attention away from the annoyed bookworm and smiling teenager.

"Souta, the goalie's supposed to catch balls, not flies," the other boy complained as Souta rubbed his aching head.

"Yeah, but she's-" Souta stopped.

"She?" Shinnosuke said with a look of disgust. "Who hangs around with girls, Souta? Either start playing or let someone else be goalie."

"All right," he said, with one last glance at the two non-spectators.

**-----**

She was showing up almost every other day now, but he was too tied to soccer practice to be able to flop down beside her like he had the first months of their acquaintance. Instead, if was the scar-faced teenager from when they joined the older boys' rough game.

He liked to note that she didn't smile at all for him. But she didn't smile for Souta either. Her eyes sometimes would, but never once had her entire face smiled. She was much too serious, even for a bookworm. But she showed her friendship in a different way. She'd listen to anybody who sat down beside her for about five minutes, before quietly standing and leaving for a spot unoccupied by chatterboxes, and it was only Souta and the teenager who were allowed more time.

Though sometimes she'd throw her book at the teenager and walk away. The two's conversations always seemed a bit off to the younger boy, as if they knew something he didn't, and talked around it without ever giving the hint that he was missing something.

He figured the missing part was neither had said they were cousins, but he knew they were. They had the same feel to them- Yoshi's mask a smile, her mask a glare, and both were as deep and mysterious as the ocean when he occasionally saw past the masks. He never bothered to wonder why they needed the masks. He had learned early on that people kept masks to hide from themselves, not from others. And they would never confess to that.

Practice ended early one day, and the teenager hadn't abandoned his spot beside the bookworm as he usually did when he knew Souta's practice was over.

" -all this talent, and you're wasting it," he overheard as he walked up to the two. "Should be finding a teacher, not playing around-"

Souta flopped down on the other side of the girl, and the teenager stopped.

"Yo."

"Nice practice. You should play offense more often."

"Nah, everyone else wants to score. I'm going to be there to crush their hopes," the boy said with a wicked grin, balling his hand up into an enthusiastic fist and waving it in the air.

The other two eyed him oddly.

"All right then," the older brunette finally said. "You just keep at it." He stood. "Catch you later," he told the two, then caught the girl's blue eyes. "Think over what I said."

She gave him a flat look. "You are not one to talk."

He chuckled and walked off.

"What's he talking about?"

"He thinks kids reading college textbooks should be taking college classes," she said off-handedly.

"Me or you?" Souta asked.

"He doesn't know I loan you my books."

They sat in silence for a time, before he finally spoke. "My birthday's coming up."

One side of her mouth quirked upwards. "I'll get you something special."

He laughed. "So, about this book on diseases you got?"

They didn't leave until long after dark.

**-----**

Yoshi sat in the middle this time, between the two smaller students.

"Ne, kid, you've known her for seven months, and you still don't even know her full name," the teen said with a laugh.

"Sitting right here," she said in a monotone voice, not bothering to look up from her literature book.

"Hush, Shan, I'm still laughing at your friend," he scolded, tugging her ponytail.

"You don't know my full name either." She shook his hand off.

Souta wasn't too old that he didn't giggle at the sight and missed the teenager's very quiet, "Want to bet?"

Color faded from her face, and she stared intently at the book, concentrating on ignoring the boys.

"Makes me wonder who's older," Yoshi commented with a laugh to Souta. "Me or her?"

She didn't deign to comment, and the two boys continued to laugh.

Souta tried to remember how boring life had been before her, and before the cheeky teenager, and couldn't. Neither cared if he was reading Dr. Seuss or proving a mathematical theorem, for all that today was only his tenth birthday. Neither cared if he played the never-scored-on goalkeeper or the you-can't-stop-me forward, so long as he continued to play where he liked, when he liked, and stopped when it isn't fun any more.

Something must have changed in his laughter, because Shan stopped reading her book and looked up at the two, her eyes unreadable. Yoshi winked her, and the look disappeared into one of frustration, and she caught Souta's eyes. He stopped laughing and just sat smiling back at her.

The look in her eyes was sad and wise, and for a moment he flinched away from the eternity her eyes held, her mask slipping on purpose this time. Yoshi could see it too, Souta knew, because he could feel the older boy beside him tense up, expecting something. The look disappeared, and the smile she gave them was brilliant, sincere, and yet full of such sorrow that Souta's eyes started watering in sympathy.

Neither boy nor teenager could speak. Souta silently vowed to never ask her to smile again if the only ones she could give were so confused between sorrow and joy.

Yoshi merely wondered where in her life she managed to find enough happiness to keep from crying as she gave that smile.

"Happy birthday, Souta-kun. Sayonara." And she got up, put on her backpack, and left the field, not looking back once.

The teenager and ten-year-old sat shell-shocked, staring after the disappearing girl.

They blinked bemusedly at each other.

"Good thing she doesn't like to smile," Yoshi finally said.

"Do all teenage girls smile like that? My sister's done that a couple times."

"If all girls smiled like that, kid, I'd find a rock to hide under. Can you imagine that smile on a grown woman? Helen of Troy probably could smile like that."

The boy thought it over, tried seeing his mother smiling like that. He shook his head. "I don't see the difference."

"Ah, you're probably too young to understand it." Yoshi coughed into his hand, hiding his faint smile. "But it still is a very nice birthday present."

Souta made a slight scoffing noise and picked up the backpack she had left. "You suppose she's coming back for this?"

Yoshi gave him an unreadable look before staring after where Shan had exited the fields. "No," he finally said. "I don't think she'll be coming back."

**-----**

It had been two months since his birthday, and he hadn't seen her since. Yoshi still came and Souta had accused the teenager of scaring her off, but the older boy just laughed and rubbed the back of his neck nervously while denying the accusation.

But Souta still liked the teen, and continued to talk about anything with him. The older boy was a better conversationalist than Shan, but Souta missed the challenges her few words always gave him. Their conversations grew odder- even including the lessons the bookworm had given about higher-level sciences.

Science gave way to philosophy- Yoshi was Buddhist- gave way to faith and belief, gave way to superstitions, and somehow, someway, it ended up Souta saying, "Why couldn't magic be real?"

The boy felt stupid, but the teenager howled with laughter and said he should have known all along, and promptly told the air to toss him his gym bag.

Souta thought the fact he hadn't screamed like a girl and run away was a feat for the ages. And once he had managed to calm down, he wanted Yoshi to teach him how to do it too.

And even with the magic lessons, he missed the bookworm, grumpy teacher, quiet friend, 'should never be allowed to smile' girl that had somehow introduced him to the wonders of higher-level education, both normal and metaphysical.

**-----**

"Ne, Mischa, please?" Kagome whined.

"Kags," the girl drawled out slowly, half-irritated.

"You never come in for dinner. It's not like there's anybody at your apartment. You don't have a roommate, you don't have a boyfriend, and there's this part of me that says I'm the closest thing you've got to a friend, and I'm _related_ to you."

The blue-eyed girl heaved a long sigh and nodded.

"Yosh!" The younger girl cheered. "We're having oden tonight, so you better plan on staying. Because Mama makes the best oden in the world."

Mischa slowly followed the cheerful junior high student up the stairs. "Why should I think I'll be getting firsts on oden night, much less expect anything left over for seconds?"

"No seconds for you," the other girl called over her shoulder. "I had to beg to make you come up for dinner. Why are you so dead set against coming here, anyway? The only other time you've visited was that first day we met."

Mischa sighed. "It's a holy shrine, Kags."

"Nani? What's that got to do with- oh."

Mischa was silent, and Kagome continued to babble about plans for dinner as they walked inside.

"Tadaima, Mama, Souta!" Kagome called out, slipping her shoes off and into slippers. "You'll never guess who I talked into for staying for dinner."

Aiko peered her head around the kitchen doorway. "Okaeri, Kagome, Souta-chan isn't home from soccer practice yet. It is good to see you again, Mischa-san."

Mischa bowed politely to her aunt. "It is a pleasure to be here, obasan. Forgive me for never visiting before."

The woman gave her a tolerant smile. "Don't worry about that, dear. You'll visit when you're ready to, and Kagome shouldn't be pushing you so hard to come."

"Mama!"

Mischa coughed into her hand to hide the smile fighting to make itself known.

They were still chatting in the small entranceway when the door opened again.

"Ne, Souta-chan, you're home early today. Usually I have to go to practice to drag you away from Yukino-san," Kagome said.

"Saa, you just come to get me to drool over him," Souta said, closing the door behind him and bending to take off muddy shoes.

"Ah, but Souta, honey, it is usually dark when you come home," his mother pointed out.

"I do my homework," he grumbled, picking up the extra set of shoes and staring at them.

"That's good to hear," Mischa said.

The shoes dropped to the ground as Souta's head snapped up.

Mischa made herself look busy by looking over the framed photographs hanging on the wall.

"You- what are- how did you-" Souta stumbled over what question to ask first.

Kagome looked between her brother and her cousin. "Ne, Souta-chan, you know Mischa?"

"Eh, Mischa-san? No-" Souta said, confused. "Shan-chan."

Mischa turned from the photographs to look at her cousins.

"You never came back," Souta accused.

"Eh? I thought you said you hadn't talked to him," Kagome said.

She stuffed her hands in her pockets and turned to her aunt. "Gomen, obasan. I shouldn't have come."

The woman gave her an amused smile as her son moved to block the door. "Dinner will be ready in twenty minutes. Try to sort things out by then." And she left the younger generation to its own problems.

Mischa stared awkwardly at her cousins, who had taken up identical poses- arms crossed over their chests, eyebrows lowered into glares, heads tilted the same exact angle forward.

"It's Meirin Mischando," she finally said, eyes focused on Souta. "When I lived with my father's family, I went by Shan. It's really only Kags and obasan who call me Mischa."

"That's because you're not on familiar terms with anybody else," Kagome said. "You'd probably call me Higurashi-san if you thought I'd let you get away with it."

"You left," Souta repeated.

"Yoshi-" she started, looking warily over at Kagome.

"Ne, you know Yukino-san, too? Mi-chan, quit hogging all the cute boys! How do you find them?" the teenager asked, putting on a mock upset face.

"Quit thinking about boys, neesan," the boy complained. His attention turned back to the girl. "So you mean to say cousin Mischa and Shan are the same person." Mischa nodded. "Why didn't you ever tell me?"

"Ne, how'd you meet in the first place?" Kagome interrupted.

"People tend to get into trouble around me," Mischa explained, ignoring Kagome. "I thought it best you didn't know. But I was still obligated to keep an eye on you."

Kagome heaved a sigh and waited for the explosion, used to the older girl's serious thoughts and the usual poor reception of said thoughts.

"Oh," Souta said. "Okay. I'll tell Yoshi-san you said hello." And the eleven-year-old took the stairs two at a time to go to his room.

"Eh?" Kagome said, staring after her little brother.

Mischa said nothing, merely moved into the living room and took post in one of the window seats.

"Ne, Mischa, who did he think you were?" Kagome asked as she followed her into the room.

Mischa sighed. "You said he was in trouble for not doing homework. I simply went to one of his games to see if I could tell what his problem was and tried to fix the problem."

"How? And how'd he buy it?"

"Kags, if a college student suddenly showed interest in tutoring you in math, would you question it or simply praise the gods and pass the textbook?"

Kagome giggled. "Point. Especially if it was a cute boy."

Mischa simply gave her cousin a long blink and flat look that said 'and why would I care?'

"So how do you know Yukino-san?"

Mischa shrugged. "The brat made me play soccer in return for the tutoring lessons. His team had already left, so he convinced the older boys to let us play."

"Ah, Yukino-san must've been one of them. Hey, I thought Yukino-san was in college, not high school," Kagome pointed out.

Mischa shrugged.

"Maybe he prefers playing with a slightly younger and inexperienced crowd," she mused.

"Actually," Souta said, his head peeking out from between railings to grin at the two, "he's talent-scouting and getting training in how to teach people to play. He wants to become a soccer coach."

"Souta, that takes all the mystery out of it," Kagome complained. Souta stuck his tongue out.

"Gaki," Mischa muttered.

"Which one?" Three heads swiveled to grin at the older woman standing in the kitchen doorway. "Now that you have things settled, would anyone care for some dinner?"

"Oden!" Kagome raced for the kitchen. Mischa bowed her head, fighting a smirk.

"Ne, Shan-chan," Souta said, reaching the bottom of the stairs. Mischa turned her head to look at him. "Why did you leave? You didn't answer."

Mischa was silent, trying to decide what to say. "Yoshi asked me to," she finally said with a sigh.

"That doesn't make any sense," the boy said, frowning a little.

She moved closer to her cousin, lowering her voice so even eavesdroppers wouldn't catch her quiet words. "It does when you realize our arguments were over whether to let me keep teaching you natural science or to let him teach you... other things."

His dark eyes widened. "You know about that?"

She didn't bother hiding her smirk this time. "Oi, gaki, how could I not? Even for someone as athletic as you, the jumps and catches you make in the goal box are a dead giveaway to the magical world that you've got talent."

"But how'd you-?" he repeated.

She winked and followed the other women into the kitchen to help with the set up. She paused in the doorway. "Oi, gaki. You might want to talk to my university about getting your grades sent to you. I've been waylaying them to my apartment, but since you already found me out about this, you might as well find out about that as well."

Souta was too hungry to be surprised. And he wasn't too surprised either. Yoshi had said that Souta knew more about science than he did, and Yoshi had a minor in the subject.

Judging by the cries of outrage coming from the kitchen, Kagome had just been refused seconds on oden until he had some first.

"Higurashi Souta, get your scrawny soccer-loving butt in here right now, you little twerp!"

The boy grinned wickedly.

**Vocabulary:  
**Gaki- Brat  
Gomen- I'm sorry  
Nani- What  
Neesan- Older sister  
Obasan- Aunt  
Okaeri- Welcome home  
Tadaima- I'm home  
Yosh- All right, okay (a sort of cheer, like hoorah)


	8. Vignette: Through Dragon's Eyes

AN: A cross between a vignette and a deleted scene. This was to have taken place sometime around Chapter 24, but it didn't fit in very well. It has some interesting information, however, and I thought it best to share.

Ayame's an interesting character, and I wish I'd had the time to further look into just what makes her who she is.

**Through Dragon's Eyes**

Saburo, like his older brothers, didn't have wings. With the exception of his five digit appendages, the three all looked the proper Japanese dragon. The five claws always gave them away- though those who didn't recognize them often thought they were Chinese. Chinese dragons had five claws and no wings. But European-Japanese mix dragons also had five claws and no wings. Provided they weren't Ayame. Ayame, though, looked simply like a European dragon, and that was okay too, because it wasn't mixing species, it was simply a foreign youkai.

The quartet weren't particularly fond of their heritage, but they had loved their parents. True to youkai tradition, neither was spoken of.

The taiyoukai often thought they were broken toys, misused by the thing that had taken over their father. And yes, they did drown themselves in the darkness that inhabited all youkai- the lust for power, the indifferent murderer, the malicious, sadistic, twisted things that they had to become if they wanted to live in the new world their family had become.

Ayame had come out worst- still only in her twenties when he had grown tired of the playful teasing their mother had always given him in everything he did. Ayame was the most like her, even then, and he had tied the child down and proceeded to give a visual aid why not to be like her mother.

Wings shredded, magic tied down with stolen holy magic none cared to dwell on, raped, dismembered, and finally eaten, piece by tiny piece. Ayame didn't like remembering her mother. Her brothers never asked about what she had seen. In the years afterwards, they saw him do the same to many others and didn't need to ask, to make their baby sister relive the sight.

She had broken. But she was youkai, and youkai always recovered, never kept scars.

Ayame was trying to erase those scars, and it was for that she had brought Souta here. So many rules to break. Don't become enamored of humans. Don't come here. Don't bring humans here. Do as I say. Break the boy, twist his mind until he can see nothing but you; and then bring him to me so that I can dissect him, discover what makes the Meirin blood so powerful, where the location of the Shikon no Tama is.

Ayame broke every one and was free of the usual sense of fear that accompanied minor disobediences.

She had no doubts that he would kill them when he discovered the transgression, but for once, it didn't seem to matter. It had taken decades of research, but they had discovered what had happened.

Ayame wasn't sorry for setting assassins on Inu-Yasha. She wanted him dead, because really, it was all his fault.

Meirin Akira, just a child, but powerful in holy magic as most Meirin scions were, had released Inu-Yasha from where he had been bound by expending all his power at once. The boy had never shown signs of magic again. That much energy hadn't been needed to release a hanyou from a short rest. Neither had it been enough to undo the centuries of taiyoukai reinforcement on the seal of an ancient dragon. But it had tried anyway.

It had released his mind, but not his power or his body. And it had run immediately to the first of its blood it sensed. Kino Hachiro, the youngest son, had disappeared under the continuous pressure of Ryukotsusei, the eldest son.

Ayame hated Inu-Yasha and the Meirin family for that.

It had been her and her brothers, over the years, wheedling the family down to a single, tortured child. Supposed accidents, brutal murders, disappearances. The only reason a single child survived to adulthood was so that the torture could be drawn out, passed onto the next generation.

Ichiro was the one to break it. Or perhaps the late Meirin Kaoru was. The man had had two daughters, and raised them to be true to their heritage, rather than changing to conform to the intruding Western society.

It had been Ichiro's turn, and he had chosen the elder, since there was no son. She had been on a pilgrimage, visiting shrines between hers and some destination she never reached. When Ichiro happened upon her in some remote mountain shrine, she had greeted him for what he was and made no pleas for mercy, for life. She was calm, cool, and accepting of the fact that the earth dragon had been there to kill her, and even scolded him for being late. Ichiro, startled, didn't make a move. And when they continued to stare at each other, he had seen something he never had in previous victims. An apology, and the mark of the gods.

Ichiro had turned and left without ever speaking, and had forbidden the others from approaching any of the descendants again. What exactlyhad spooked him, he never explained, simply said that only fools meddled in the affairs of the gods.

Ayame had been the one to break that order nearly thirty years later, befriending the youngest Meirin at the behest of her father.

She still hated Souta for being a Meirin, for being a descendant of the boy who had unwittingly released the spirit of Ryukotsusei upon her family. But his easy-going acceptance of who and what she was began to make her doubt their actions towards the family.

And Ayame hated him for that too. Youkai did not feel guilty for their actions.

She would never tell him the harm she and her brothers had done to his family. It was in the past, and Souta didn't live in the past. He lived in the now of things, and now he was her friend and that was what mattered.

And she found she didn't hate the young human at all.


	9. Vignette: Same Old Life As Before

AN: Angsty-type short fic for _One Wish_ from Kagome's voice's point of view. Thought of view. Whatever. Also an experiment in writing a songfic. I don't think it worked, but I thought you might like the information the presence hints around.

The next chapter for _One Wish _should be up sometime next week. Hopefully.

Summary: The pink presence muses on its many years. On everyone else's lack of those same years.

… Just to confuse you more. Or clear things up, depending on how twisted your ability to think is. (My mind makes a Moebius Strip look simple.)

Disclaimer: Quite frankly, if I took out the few mentions of names, this would be a completely original piece. But there is mention of names from Inu-Yasha, and nothing concerning the series is my brainchild."Going Under" is by Evanescence and used without permission.

**Déjà Vu: Same Old Life As Before**

_( "Do you think I wish to go through this a fifth time?")_

_Now I will tell you what I've done for you_

Little miko, do you realize how many centuries of life you have made me relive, over and over again? Each time you come to the climax, the final triumph of good over evil in your black and white world, you recall all the deaths you had to wade through to come to that moment. And each time, you wish it had not happened.

_50 thousand tears I've cried_

It's been well over a thousand years for me. None for you. This is my fourth time. It is always the first time for you. Always. And looking at you now, it seems a fifth time is a very real possibility.

_Screaming Deceiving and Bleeding for you_

You are breaking them. Rin ran the moment she got a look at what her future was. Kagura is descending into madness. Kohaku is giving in to apathy. Miroku drowns himself in sex in every life and tells himself that everything is fine. Kikyo is all but lost in pain and death and wonders when she'll be allowed to give up completely. Sango gave up long ago. Continually watching your family be destroyed lifetime after lifetime will do that to a soul.

_And you still won't hear me  
__I'm going under_

Is **not** wishing for something so difficult for you? I have been trying to show you that death is as necessary as life, but you continue to cling to the souls you have met. They have no wish to keep reliving those awful lives, keep dying again.

_Don't want your hand this time I'll save myself  
__Maybe I'll wake up for once_

Can you not see them shatter? Can you not feel the pain that clings to them? Let them go. Immature possessiveness is only bringing all of you more pain. Why can you not hear the message underlying my words?

_Not tormented daily defeated by you  
__Just when I thought I'd reached the bottom_

How I long to give you the words to tell you what must be done. But even I am bound by rules. You must figure things out on your own, but you are never given the chance to mature to a point where you can truly make your choices with all the information.

_I'm dying again_

By your time, it has been thousands of years since I first came to be in this state of existence. What is another thousand years? Foolish little girl.

_I'm going under  
__Drowning in you  
__I'm falling forever_

I miss myself. I miss who I once was. Death would have been preferable.

_I've got to break through  
__I'm going under_

Not this half-free, half-captive life my son has bound me to. He did not realize how aware I would be when he transmuted my power into this artificial sparkle of life. He does not know what will happen should anyone but you handle the power.

_Blurring and Stirring the truth and the lies  
So I don't know what's real and what's not_

No one knows what will happen should any but the chosen miko handles it. How could they? It has never happened in this fourth trial. Only I remember the darkness that crossed the world the last time. It has no longer happened- wished away by a selfish little girl. Only I remember. Does that mean it only happened for me?

_Always confusing the thoughts in my head  
__So I can't trust myself anymore_

In the last trials, I never spoke to you. I thought you had a good head on your shoulders, that you could handle the responsibility foisted upon you so unexpectedly. I grew impatient, and spoke this time. Was it wise? I cannot remember my thoughts concerning the first conversation we had. Too many memories crowd together in my mind, and in the simplified existence my son imprisoned me in, I do not have the power required to handlethem all.

_I'm dying again_  
_I'm going under_

Am I going mad?

_Drowning in you_

Have the decency to free us, little miko. Stop making wishes based on **your** reality. You seem to think pain is bad.

_I'm falling forever  
__I've got to break through_

If you are never hurt, though, how could you tell when you are not hurt? This pain is necessary; but the repetition is **not**.

_So go on and scream_

So young. So foolish. So selfish. Why must the fate of the world continue to rest on your naïve shoulders? Why can I not change it?

_Scream at me I'm so far away_

Kikyo was no better; she had the same wish as you. Normality. Peace. And all she got was suffering. Just as you will. Face it, this life as Higurashi Kagome was written in the stars as one of conflict and pain.

_I won't be broken again  
__I've got to breathe I can't keep going under_

It is not as if you will never get another chance at life. For someone so intent on seeing only the best in the world, when it comes to the crucial moment, you dwell on only the bad that has happened.

_I'm dying again_

When the time to wish comes again, little miko, I hope you will understand why I will despise you and make your wish even worse than the reality you already must suffer in.

_I'm going under_

I am going mad. This form cannot handle the reality of my existence.

_Drowning in you_

Selfish little girl. Foolish little girl.

_I'm falling forever  
__I've got to break through_

I do not want to go through this a fifth time.

_I'm going under_

No wish. Please.


	10. Outtake: Better Research Required

AN: I suppose this could be filed under Bloopers. I found the idea amusing, I hope it brings laughter your way as well. Takes place around chapter thirty, or would if I suddenly leapt from action/drama to humor. I'm not, but it's still funny to read. OOCness on the part of Kino/Ryukotsusei, but oh well, that's why it's not actually part of _One Wish_.

Next chapter for _One Wish_ will be posted by the end of July. Sorry for delays- I'm trying to get two original stories drawn up, and Kagome and the crew have had to take a backseat.

Summary: When casting dark ancient spells found in tomes dating back to the days the gods walked the earth, try to remember that they always leave out the important bits just so no one can cast the spell but the spell's creator. And never assume that, just because someone's anti-social, they don't get laid.

Disclaimer: Souta, Ryukotsusei, and the Shikon no Tama courtesy of Rumiko Takeshi. Mischa, Ayame, and Hizashi products of a deranged mind and available for loans.

**Better Research Required**

There was a great flash of white light.

When the stars faded from their eyes, there was no change. The dragon remained entombed in the cliff, the four unwilling participants in the ceremony remained bound- though the gags seemed to have been lost in the windstorm the magic had summoned- and Kino Hachiro looked no different than what he was before the ceremony. Besides low energy levels from the ceremony- meaning it had been completed, just something went wrong.

Hizashi started giggling.

Kino leveled a stare at her. "What do you find so amusing?" he growled out.

Her smile was brilliant. "The Shikon no Tama," she said between snickers, "is comprised of holy energy."

"I know that," he snapped.

Her smile hadn't faded. "It gets better. One needs a participant in the ceremony that is similar to the item in question. Soone must havea holy person. Barring that-" She stopped to snicker again. "Someone pure." She started laughing out right. As she continued to laugh, she gasped out, "Virginal."

Souta and Ayame had identical blushes on their faces and were quick to look in the opposite direction of the other. This meant Souta made eye contact with Mischa, whoarched one dark eyebrow. His blush brightened. Hizashi's musical laughter regained momentum watching the display.

"What the fuck?" the dragon yelled in an out of character display of uncouth behavior. He glared at his daughter. Her olive skin was reddening under the angry stare and she stared hard at the ground. "Who did you sleep with, girl?"

"Well," she managed to say in a tremulous voice, even as her skin became as red as her crimson eyes, "you _did_ say to keep an eye on him."

Mischa snorted and Souta squirmed under the angry gaze Kino turned on him. "You slept with my daughter!"

"Niece," Ayame corrected under her breath.

Souta copied Ayame's move and stared resolutely at the ground. He was fifteen and his best friend was a pretty girl who liked to flirt. What did they expect?

Kino wasn't finished with him yet, but there was one last person to question. It was unsurprising to learn Hizashi, with her three centuries of life, had not remained chaste solely for this ceremony.

It was harder for hanyou to find bedmates, however.

Mischa's gaze met his unabashedly, and her face was too smudged with dirt and blood to tell if she was blushing.

"What's your excuse?" he asked, giving her a flat stare.

"As if you don't know what the snake did to her," Ayame said, distracting him from the quiet human.

Mischa's gaze met Souta's as the dragon turned to snarl at his daughter about the difference between physical rape and mental rape. Her gaze focused on the left side of his face again and he gave a small choke as realization hit him.

Kino, of course, automatically thought the worst. "Your own cousin?" he said, turning to see Mischa staring at Souta, some incomprehensible human emotion written across her face.

Ayame made a small gagging noise that transformed into a growl- youkai were possessive.

"Soccer really keeps him fit," Mischa said vaguely.

Ayame glowered, and Mischa glared right back. Kino continued to make small noises of disgust, trying to wrap his mind around the idea of a wolf hanyou and a human teenager in bed together. It wasn't a pretty picture.

Ayame, on the other hand, was using her sharp mind for other matters- trying to recall who Souta spent a lot of time with that Mischa would know. And that played soccer, if the woman wasn't lying. She choked as she realized who the woman was talking about.

"You pervert!" she said, playing along with Mischa. Anything to distract Kino from trying the ceremony again. "Stick to people your own age!" Souta and Hizashi choked on laughter at that remark, but it was lost on the dragon.

"Your own cousin," Kino said, frowning at her. "I knew hanyou were off in the head- makes them easier to handle- but that's disgusting."

"Coming from someone possessing his brother's still-living body while trying to resurrect his own," Hizashi said, "this one feels the pot is calling the kettle black."

Mischa simply hoped Yoshi appreciated the effort she was putting in to keep him from coming to the dragon's notice. Though if the purity thing were true, Yoshi wouldn't be any more of a help than the rest of them were.

And the relationship was far more distant than cousins, anyway.


End file.
